


The Adventures of Coyote and Dragonfly

by s_decoy



Category: Miraculous Ladybug, Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: AU, Deadlock McCree, Fluff, M/M, McHanzo - Freeform, Miraculous AU, Noodle Dragons, Young Hanzo Shimada, Young Jesse McCree, Young Jesse McCree/Hanzo Shimada, lots of characters mentioned as akumas, love square, original kwami
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-26
Updated: 2018-04-26
Packaged: 2018-09-27 03:12:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 39,989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9949790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/s_decoy/pseuds/s_decoy
Summary: Hanzo’s life is in turmoil: his family’s crime dynasty is falling to pieces, he and his brother are trapped in a desolate American town while their father handles business, and a sudden crop of horrible magical monsters have appeared out of nowhere in their new home of Santa Fe. He’s offered a chance to take control of his supernatural problems: Between fighting with his brother, attending school in a foreign country, and saving the city from terrifying beasts, he definitely doesn’t need a stupid crush on his plate, too, but magic can’t fix everything...





	1. Primordial Rage

**Author's Note:**

> this is possibly the most work and planning i have ever put into a fic, to date. i've been super hyped since i started outlining and i really hope that it's as enjoyable to read as it was to write!!! thank you for giving it a chance, and a really big thanks to gramps for helping me come up with costumes, akumas, and motivating me to finish this chapter!

Hanzo’s nose was nearly flush with the dusty train window, body pressed uncomfortably close to the car’s peeling wallpaper as his brother snoozed on his shoulder. Genji’s body bridged their first-class seats and Hanzo propped his chin up on his wrist, eyes trained to the red rock outside the window that swallowed him with the rattle and shake of each passing mile, feeding on his own tiredness as it had his brother’s. The landscape may as well have been Martian, as alien as it was - even the sky was orange, though he supposed that was more due to the late hour than the desert. Every little pink flower he spied sprouting from a jade cactus was a pang in his stomach that ached to return home against his father’s wishes, but he was trapped on an old-fashioned train - still running on tracks, he couldn’t believe it when they had boarded - headed into the heart of the barren desert. What his father saw in this place, this country even, was a mystery to him, but he would sooner go to hell than disobey the man that had raised him and earned his respect for his fearless leadership of the clan. Never before had he seen such an terror in the old man’s eyes than when he herded his two sons into the back of an unmarked black car, windows tinted and headlights cut in the dark of midnight; the vision of the frantic goodbye still clung to Hanzo’s mind, tainting his fond memories of the timid summer breezes in the courtyard of his childhood home as he tried desperately to recall them for comfort. 

Bumping and lurching along its track, the train was blissfully unaware of his conflicts. Clouds of dust in the hues of a sunset danced around the great beast’s wheels and puffed up around Hanzo’s little looking glass to the outside world beyond the buzz of the air conditioning and his brother’s sour breath on his cheek. He made a mental note to tell Genji to brush his teeth when they arrived at their temporary apartment, he had neglected to do so during their travels. Unlike his brother, seemingly, he was fed up with sleeping during the day, drawing shut the heavy curtains of cheap motel rooms and moonless nights of driving across the American continent until the omnic their father had left as their driver and guardian had finally produced train tickets to their final destination - Santa Fe, New Mexico. 

Before they had left, his father had explained the choice, albeit briefly. Out of all of his dirty business connections halfway across the world, none was as loyal to the family as the Deadlock Gang that roamed the red desert of the Southwest. They were a pack of wild dogs, faithful to the last breath, and the leader of the Shimada had earned their trust long ago. He had not contacted them yet - for lack of knowledge of their swift departure, he claimed, but the gang knew his face, knew of Hanzo and Genji. They would be safe in America until order was restored to their home. Fraternizing with such a gang was not exactly Hanzo’s idea of a good time, but he would do anything to put his father’s mind at peace.

\--

The sky had again taken to an inky color when the train finally scuttled into the station. Genji woke with a loud yawn and a lanky stretch of his bare arms, a smack of his dry lips and Hanzo rolled his eyes. 

“Father’s absence is no excuse to fall behind on your hygiene, brother,” he scolded in Japanese as he stood from his seat with a much more reserved pop of his joints. Genji snickered and stood himself, blowing a puff of hot air at Hanzo’s nose. The older boy faux-gagged and shoved Genji towards the train doors as he gathered their small amount of luggage. Their guardian was in storage a few cars back, which seemed a little unfair, but it had insisted. 

The omnic rented a car for the short drive into town, and they traveled mostly in silence. Genji was awake, at least, but he kept his attention turned to the window, as did Hanzo. As much as he loved the classic look of his hometown, he had to admit the attraction of the architecture, ancient-looking stone cast in the soft yellow glow of street lamps made for a pleasant change of the scenery from the desert train ride - no two structures looked entirely the same, in fact, until they hit the city center.

As they entered the apartment nestled in one of the moderate high-rises, Hanzo realized with a drop in his stomach how well-prepared his father had been for an emergency such as this. It was fully furnished: a few thin carpets covered the pale wood of the floor and a sofa sat opposite a television in the parlor, a ring of keys to a car parked in the building garage on the kitchen counter. The apartment itself was pleasant enough, but it signalled a warning deep in his mind that their departure was not as impromptu as he had been lead to believe. 

Genji ignored the lightly decorated living room and plowed through Hanzo with his suitcase, ducking his head into the two rooms down the hallway one by one as the omnic backed out of the doorway to return the rental car, informing them that it would return shortly. 

“Yeah, yeah. Dibs on this one!” Hanzo fumbled out of his thoughts, following Genji’s voice towards their bedrooms. He wandered through the open door to the unclaimed room and tucked his bags into the empty closet, then collapsed onto a plush white comforter tucked into the tall bed. The room itself was fairly plain, but a heavy pair of blue velvet drapes hung parted to reveal a small balcony overlooking the street and bustling city below, and the bed frame and dresser were a rich cherry-tinted wood reminiscent of his room back at the castle in Hanamura. Comfortable enough for an extended stay, but he was too tired to ponder the ramifications of that. Hanzo kicked off the pair of Genji’s sneakers he had borrowed and burrowed himself under the blankets, passing out before remembering that Genji had not yet brushed his teeth.

\--

A sliver of sunlight tickling Hanzo’s eyes the next morning stirred him a few hours before noon - perhaps one benefit to sneaking across the country in a matter of days was the lack of jet lag. Abrasive fabric stuck to his collar and stomach as he squirmed under the heavy blankets, recalling that he had forgotten to remove his - or his brother’s, rather - clothes before falling asleep. Genji’s modern wardrobe was better suited to blending into the city, no matter how garish the colors. His own training armors and robes would look out of place even in the majority of their own country, so Genji’s t-shirts and jeans it was, for the both of them. 

Rolling out from under the covers and stumbling on his sleeping toes, Hanzo sludged to the door of his new room. Light from the balcony window forced his eyes shut to a squint as he cracked it open and made for the kitchen. As his vision adjusted to the waking world, he found Genji already slouched in the sofa with a granola bar in his mouth and a portable game in his hands; he turned as he heard the soft slip of Hanzo’s socks across the wood floors.

“Who’s falling behind on hygiene now, Hanzo?” Genji snorted through his breakfast, hopping to his feet already dressed for the day ahead. Hanzo grunted in a tired attempt at a sarcastic laugh, but his brother had always been the morning person. The omnic was in the kitchen, and as he rounded the island counter it placed a white mug of black coffee in front of him. He settled into a barstool and Genji bounced up into the one next to him. “It’s instant, there isn’t a lot of food. New Dad said it’ll get groceries while we’re touring the local school.”

“Mmf,” Hanzo groaned, resting his face in his arms on the counter. He considered taking a sip of the coffee, but he didn’t want to burn his tongue. Besides, he preferred tea, and New Dad would- wait. “What did you call it?” Hanzo sat up stock straight again as Genji burst into a fit of giggles. 

“New Dad! Since we’ll probably never see father again,” his brother repeated, more solemn but the grin remained, brushing an anxious hand through his spring-green locks and fingering at where the dye was beginning to fade. 

“Don’t...” Hanzo began, slumping into himself. “Don’t say that.” Genji didn’t reply that time, but snaked a hand across the counter to grab Hanzo’s mug. He took a long sip and sighed. 

“We can talk about it some other time,” He sized up Hanzo’s wrinkled outfit. “C’mon.” Genji set the mug back down and dropped from the stool back onto his feet, tugging his brother towards their bedrooms. 

Hanzo groaned in protest but allowed himself to be jerked along and shoved into his own room, followed by a pair of jeans and a fresh shirt Genji had picked before he had woke. His own door slammed behind him. 

“Be careful!” He whined at the loud noise, which was followed by another bout of Genji’s airy laughter. Stripping his sweaty clothes and wishing he had more time to shower properly, he changed into the clothes his brother had provided. Despite Genji being a year younger, the jeans were a tad long on his ankles, even with their high waistband. The little green imp had managed to grow taller than Hanzo years earlier, and he had never caught back up. He brushed his fingers through his long hair hurriedly, gathering it into a smooth ponytail at his neck.

Quiety, Hanzo clicked his door back open to find his brother waiting for him on the other side, leaning up against the wall. He scrunched his heavy brows for a moment, then reached in to tuck Hanzo’s light blue top into the hem of his jeans. 

“Even better than yesterday,” Genji grinned and tossed a light jacket across the hall for Hanzo to catch. If Genji found comfort in picking his clothes, Hanzo couldn’t find it in himself to complain. He remembered his father’s tight grip on his wrist as he was shoved into the car, begging for him to take good care of his little brother, keep him happy - the memory sent a jolt of ice down his spine and he shivered, slipping the jacket over his arms. The front door clicked open and snapped Hanzo back to the present.

“I’ll be right back,” he assured the omnic and Genji as he dipped back into his room for a moment, returning with a folded umbrella.

“Are you serious?” Genji quirked a brow. “We’re in the middle of the desert!”

“I read the forecast online,” Hanzo defended, looping it around his wrist. With what little control he seemed to have over his life at the moment, the very least he could do was be prepared for anything.

\--

Their new school was a sunny few minute’s walk away from the apartment, which Hanzo was grateful for. He didn’t want kids asking questions about the new students’ fancy car and high-class omnic help. Attending a public school at all had been Hanzo’s idea in the first place - holing up and wasting away inside with homeschool lessons just wasn’t as pleasant anywhere but their true home at Shimada castle. Genji had vouched for it, as well, he had always had a fondness for cowboy stories as a child, what use was living in that very Southwest if he didn’t get to meet a few?

Genji’s wish was granted as soon as they stepped into a small office down the school’s main hall. Leaning back casually in a chair tucked into the modest desk was a boy capped with a classic Stetson and a burgeoning scruffy beard, rocking back with his leather boots propped up on the desk. He didn’t even glance back at the two as they clicked the door shut, but he dropped back to his feet as the other door in the room opened and in came a hulking blonde man. The man shot a warning look at the boy in the chair, who stared coolly back, flicking a lollipop stick between his teeth. 

“Jesse, I’ve told you to keep your feet off of my desk,” the blonde was clad in a finely pressed formal shirt as blue as his eyes, and his tall form thumped down into the chair on the other side of the desk.

“Whoops,” the cowboy finally looked over to the two brothers, silent in a corner of the office. He winked up at Hanzo, folding one leg over the other. 

Hanzo blinked in surprise, then scowled and averted his eyes. Boys were Genji’s frivolities, not his. Jesse shrugged and turned back to the principal, straightening the lapel of his dusty riding jacket. Genji shanked his elbow into Hanzo’s rib. 

“Don’t be rude,” he snickered in Japanese, but Hanzo remained silent, rubbing the bruise gently.

“Your filthy boots are not what you are here to discuss, at any length,” the blonde man reminded Jesse. Hanzo spied a name placard on his desk and in the glinting sunlight from the window, he could just make out ‘Jack Morrison’. Jack cleared his throat as Jesse feigned insult, polishing his boots with his knuckles. “Luckily for you, I’ve got more urgent matters to attend to, and they are ten minutes early,” he gestured towards Hanzo and Genji. 

“Thanks, guys,” Jesse lurched to his feet and gave a curt nod towards the brothers as he made to leave.

“Not so fast,” Jack stood again, and if he looked more than a little smug as Jesse stopped short and his shoulders sank, Hanzo ignored it. “You can wait here while I give these nice boys a tour of the school.”

Jess let out a long, puppy-like whine as he collapsed back into the wooden chair. Hanzo snickered behind a hand as the principal lead them out of his office. 

“Can’t I join ya?” the delinquent cowboy offered hopefully, but the door slammed on his request.

\--

After a monotonous history of the public school’s building and an overly detailed tour, the brothers were back on the streets, though they were no longer so sunny. Hanzo smiled smugly as he popped his little umbrella open in the rolling downpour. Genji reluctantly joined him beneath it and they set off. 

Hanzo tuned into the sounds of the rain as Genji gushed about that cute boy in the office, how if he wasn’t going to go after him, someone else would have to, in reference to himself. The water thumped a bass sound into his umbrella, squelched in the dust below his sneakers and snaked down the surrounding buildings. He could hear the pleasant tap of his own feet, his brother’s, and another unidentified pair. With the streets mostly bare, it was easy to pick out a squat old man, hair white and hide like tanned leather, speckled with moles. His thin wisps of hair and beard dripped down him like white water as he stumbled through the road with a wooden cane. As though he felt Hanzo’s curious gaze, he looked up. Their eyes met for a moment before the man’s frail body came tumbling down to the ground, splashing in the puddles. 

Genji gave a noncommittal hiss of sympathy, then a squeak of surprise when Hanzo changed direction without thinking, picking up the pace to a trot until he could kneel at the man’s side. 

“Bless you,” he mumbled weakly as Hanzo offered a hand under the dry of his umbrella and lifted him back to his feet. 

“It’s no trouble,” Hanzo assured. Once the man was standing again, Hanzo slipped the rubber grip of the umbrella into his fingers, wrinkled and knotted like tree roots. The man adjusted his rain-spotted glasses to look back up at Hanzo, then nodded and patted his arm in thanks. Genji whined from the other side of the sidewalk as Hanzo returned to his side, hiking his jacket up to cover his hair as they sprinted the short distance back to the lobby of the high rise. 

“Awful good heart you have for the heir to a criminal empire,” Genji rolled his eyes and gave his back a light slap once they were safely out of the rain.

\--

The next morning, Genji woke Hanzo, rather than the sun. A delicate poke to his cheek, followed by a sudden robbery of his blankets, had him on his feet in seconds.

Like it had promised, the omnic had purchased enough groceries to sustain the boys for a while, and a small breakfast was already prepared when Hanzo sleepily toddled to the kitchen, still in his pajamas. He had stayed up later than he would like to admit the night before, fretting over his father back home and to a lesser extent, their first day of school. A warm cup of tea promised momentary relief - it’s not quite the same as back home when it washes down his throat, but similar enough for a pang of homesickness to grip his neck. False advertising, but he kept drinking. 

Despite the previous day’s downpour, the steps to the school were dry by the time Hanzo and Genji reached them. A few lingering students meandered up and down, but as he climbed, Hanzo’s eyes were drawn upwards. Lounging nonchalantly in front of a set of double-doors was the same boy they’d seen in the principal’s office, staring intently right back down at the sidewalk. Before Hanzo could be angry, he followed Jesse’s gaze to a loose trio of other students a few feet away. Jeers and shouts could be heard, and a soft plea for mercy after each aborted shove two gave towards the other.

Hanzo looked back up to Jesse. His brows were furrowed, teeth ground together as he sat still, face contrasting the laid-back position his body held up against the side of the school. Eyes followed every move of the little group, and the moment one of the outer ring laid his hands on the shortest boy, all the tension in his body erupted. 

“Knock it off!” Jesse sprang to his feet, fists clenched as he ducked under the stair railing to reach the boys and push aside two of the bigger ones, dragging their victim out by his arm. The smaller one sighed in relief as Jesse blocked him off. As he came into view, Hanzo realized that he couldn’t have been much older than twelve, hugging the very same weighty textbooks that Hanzo held in his own bag to his chest. 

Deep in the school building, an alarm buzzed. Genji reacted first, tugging at Hanzo’s jacket sleeve as he stood, mildly entranced as Jesse chewed out the bullies.

“Hanzo, please! We’ll be late!” his brother whined as Hanzo neglected to follow. At Genji’s words, Jesse glanced over his shoulder at them. Now that he had caught the vigilante’s gaze, Hanzo lowered his head and scurried towards the door with Genji at his side. Even from inside the building, he could still hear Jesse shouting expletives at the boys, daring them to pick on someone their own size. Though the cowboy was still a mite shorter than both of them, Hanzo had an inkling of thought that they would still be picking a losing fight. He chuckled internally as he neared the classroom the principal had shown him the day before - perhaps the ‘delinquent’ was more than what had met his eye.

 

\--

The cowboy had saved him this time, but he might not be there the next day - he hadn’t been there the day before. Winston sighed heavily as Jesse herded the two upperclassmen inside the building, in relief or defeat even he couldn’t say. When he had been offered the chance to move into accelerated classes at the high school, skipping multiple grades at a time, he had leapt at the opportunity. His head had been filled with dreams of graduating early, moving on to working with the national space program like he’d wanted since he was old enough to talk. What he hadn’t considered were the social ramifications - he had no way to deal with boys twice his size picking on him besides hoping for the occasional mercy from a passerby or teacher. No matter how early he snuck in, they found him, pestering and pursuing him until retreating to avoid being late. Sometimes he wished he was their size, just for a day - he’d smack some respect into them, damn the consequences. 

“Why stop with them? I can make you big enough to smack plenty of sense into anyone or anything you wish.”

Winston looked up in surprise, scanning the area. The late bells had already rung; he was alone outside, as far as he could see. 

“Who said that?” he wondered suspiciously, giving the sky a good once-over as well.

“I am the Reaper, little boy, and you are now my beast,” the disembodied voice whispered, gravelly and low. Its tone indicated that this was fact - not up for discussion.

“I’m not so sure I-,” Winston’s voice was cut off by a tightness in his throat, he gagged and collapsed to his knees, chest throbbing as his vision went dark.

\--

Hanzo was absentmindedly playing with a lock of his own hair, faintly listening to the teacher outline a concept he had learned years earlier in his homeschooling, when the classroom went dark. A girl screamed from the back corner, and a few boys laugh until the announcement system crackled to life.

“This is not a drill. Commence lockdown procedures! An unidentified creature is outside the building!” he recognized the panicked voice of the burly blonde principal, even through the low quality audio relay. The students fell silent and the teacher rushed to the windows to draw the blinds. She’s not quite fast enough, and before the crackly plastic draws over the final pane, a horrifying face peered inside. 

It’s hard to see through the glare in its fishbowl helmet, but it appeared to be a mass of living tar, speckled with festering stars and galaxies. They squirmed and swirled in its gaping maw as it gave a mighty roar that shook the very building. This time, there were significantly more screams. The same liquid made up its entire form, from dagger-like teeth dripping with celestial drool to its writhing tongue, making for a display as disgusting as it was terror-inducing. Hanzo stood quietly from his seat while the rest of the class was distracted with the beast and slipped out the door as he felt his stomach churn and his breakfast bubble in his throat. Some realistic nightmare, this was. He made swiftly for the bathrooms across the hall; even in a dream he would prefer to avoid vomiting on the classroom floor.

After a thorough rinse of his mouth with the lukewarm water from the sink tap, Hanzo reached inside his bag for the cheap cell phone the omnic had given him the night before, intending to check up on dream-Genji. Before the smooth plastic of the phone, though, his fingertips brushed a fine wooden box. 

“Odd,” he murmured, sliding it out into the dim lighting from a frosted window on the wall. Octagonal in shape, black with red and gold accents painted a distinctly eastern design - not the type of thing he would expect to find in the deserts of North America, certainly. When he pops the lid open, he’s greeted with a puff of dust and stale-smelling air, which he blows away with a breath of his own air. Inside rests a golden silk ribbon, folded pristinely. Its fishscale pattern glints in the low light, and Hanzo reaches down to run a forefinger along it. The moment his skin brushes the ancient silk, blue smoke erupts from somewhere within it. Startled, Hanzo tosses the box up, and it lands in the sink.

“Careful with that!” an offended voice scolds, and Hanzo squeaks in surprise, whipping around to look for the speaker. He comes eye-to-eye with a miniature blue dragon floating in mid-air, long and lean with a beard and horns. Its tiny claws scrabble at the air as it bounds on top of his shoulder and launches off it, landing in the sink next to the box. 

“S-sorry,” Hanzo lifts the box gently in two hands. “This is becoming an awfully strange dream...”

“This is no dream, my Dragonfly,” the little beast floats from the sink and brings its miniscule fangs down into the flesh of his thumb.

“Ow! That-” Hanzo’s eyes widen. “Hurt?”

“Do you believe me?” the dragon blinks its eyes tiredly as Hanzo nods his head vigorously, breathing beginning to hitch.

“That thing outside is real?”

“Of course,” It coolly drifts to sit atop the ribbon. “I am Toyoll, a Kwami. If you so wish, I will grant you the power to stop it.” The dragon’s voice is more serious as it makes its offer. 

“Excuse me? Stop it?” he nearly chokes on his own spit. “I could hardly look at it!”

“Quite unfortunate,” Toyoll yawned.

“Can’t you ask-” but the Kwami cut him off.

“No, no. No one else,” it waved its paw at him, scoffing. “You have been chosen. Either you accept these powers, or the monster will run free and destroy this city.” 

“Those aren’t very fair choices...” he murmurs, and the dragon flits up to sit on his shoulder. 

“Hurry and decide, boy, that thing is wreaking havoc as we speak!” Toyoll stopped still for a moment, then clawed at a loose strand of hair. “Once you put the ribbon on, there’s no turning back, but gold is definitely a good color for you,” it smirked. 

“As if I didn’t know that...” Hanzo tried his best to laugh back, but his fingers shake over the soft surface of the magic ribbon. He was duty-bound to keep his brother safe while their father fixed the clan’s affairs - if that meant protecting him and the rest of the town from a horrifying slime monster, then so be it. 

“Just say, ‘transform me’.”

He reached up to tie the ribbon into his ponytail, thin fabric almost buzzing between his fingers.

“T-transform me?” he stuttered, squeezing his eyes shut. As the knot in the ribbon tightens, Toyoll disappears, and he feels a cool, cleansing wave wash over his body. 

\--

“Jesse, stay here while I check the hallway for stragglers, okay?” Jack’s voice is panicked as he dug through his desk drawers for a flashlight. Jesse nodded, speechless, as he stares at the creature’s body through the window. Its feet were the size of cars, leaving dents in the grassy field out back. It had materialized out of seemingly thin air just a few minutes after the principal had busted him for cursing and yelling at those bullies - sometimes it felt like Jack had a vendetta against him. 

“Let me out! Hey!” a muffled voice from the ground caught his attention as the door slammed shut.

 

“Who...” he furrowed his brows as he peeked over the desk and found nobody.

“In your bag, dumbass!” 

“Rude,” Jesse grimaced and popped his messenger bag open. A blur of orange-brown fur came hurling out, flinging itself onto the brim of his hat. 

“The box, the box!” it urged, and Jesse spied an unfamiliar box among his books. 

“What’s with the rush?” he wondered as he lifted it to eye level, peering along the red and gold designs.

“We’re late!” the fur peeked down over his hat, and Jesse could finally see a long snout and whiskers. It looked a bit like a scruffy dog, if dogs were the size of fat caterpillars. “Can’t leave your partner waiting!”

“Pardner?” Jesse clicked the box open. 

“Part. Ner,” the dog repeated, deadpan, clearly unamused with his drawl. Inside the box lay a garishly large vanity belt buckle, bearing the acronym BAMF.

“God, that’s awful,” Jesse chuckled, lifting it and dropping the box to the desk unceremoniously to give it a better look over. “This for me?”

“Not so fast! If you put on that buckle, you are accepting the duty of protecting this city from monsters!” the pup tumbled from the brim of his hat down to his shoulder. “I am Wenndi, and I can give you magical powers if you choose to-”

“Hell yeah!” Jesse’s eyes widened. 

“Oh. You... Really?” Wenndi seemed confused, blinking. “It’s a full time job, you know. No going back.”

“I get it, I know,” Jesse waved the words off. “I’m down! Let’s go! Can’t keep that partner you mentioned waitin’.”

“Right, right,” Wenndi sighed. “Well, then, Coyote. Just say ‘transform me’,” the cowboy nodded as he finished fastening the buckle to his belt.

“Transform me?” the tiny dog vanished, and an invigorating fire rushed down his limbs.

\--

“Hey!” A loud bark from the ground caught Dragonfly’s attention as he watched the monster turn its attention away from the school and towards the rest of the city, ignoring him completely. From a wider perspective, it’s easy to see that the soupy monster is contained in a white space suit. A figure leapt up on the roof of the school, stumbling up next to him. “Damn, that’s gonna take some gettin’ used to,” He chuckled. “So, I figured you’re probably my partner, right?” He offered a hand.

“Partner?” Dragonfly’s eyes lit up. “I don’t have to defeat it alone?” He tentatively placed his right hand, decked in a fingerless glove, into the man’s own leather-clad fingers.

“‘Course not! Coyote, at your service. And, you are?” he gave a slight tip of his Stetson with a grin, an excited glint in his masked eyes as he sized up his new partner. Blue horns sprouted from his head, along with the tail of a serpentine predator at his hips. A tight black braid fell down his back, fanned by a delicate golden scarf, and an intricate swirl of scaley ink peeked from his bare shoulder. “Well, damn lovely, for one thing,” Coyote gave a soft whistle, and the skin below the soft dusting of blue and gold scales on Dragonfly’s cheeks glowed pink. He pursed his lips and withdrew his hand, swiveling back towards the lumbering beast tearing up the road into downtown. 

“Aw, what’s wrong?” Coyote pouted. Dragonfly was silent as he brought the delicate bow on his back forward, and Coyote mirrored with the silver revolver at his hip. 

“I am not here to flirt with you,” Dragonfly mumbled, pulling back his empty bowstring and taking aim at the monster’s massive back, and an arrow forms from thin air as he releases. The magic weapon is similar enough in weight and give to his bow back in Hanamura, one that he loved to spend long hours practicing with when he had finished his studies for the day. A fondness for this new weapon crept into his skin and he grips it a little tighter.

“Don’t mean I can’t,” Coyote gave the gun a spin, testing its weight.

“Watch out!” Dragonfly grabbed onto the royal blue bandana around Coyote’s neck as the great, slow beast very suddenly crashed its fat hand into the roof of the school and leapt into the air to avoid it. The two landed on the demolished road.

“Phew! You done this before, darlin’?” 

“No!” Dragonfly barked, exasperated, and jumped up onto the building across the street, scaling the face of it. The creature took another swing, stomping its foot into where Coyote had stood moments before for leverage. Just before the fist hits, Dragonfly hopped to the roof of the building, letting the monster slam its knuckles into the concrete and windows. The massive white glove is trapped for a moment, and Dragonfly prayed silently for it to stick. To no avail, though, as it is ripped right back out, no worse for the wear. In comes the glove again, smacking flat against the roof Dragonfly stands atop. He dodged with another leap, but his timing was off and he landed on the back of its hand. Coyote made his way back to the roof of the school, skipping over the widening hole above the middle of the hallway. He took careful aim with his revolver, this time at the fishbowl helmet rather than the larger target of the monster’s back as Dragonfly sprinted across its arm. Luckily, it’s too sluggish to shake the hero before he reached the relative safety of the beast’s shoulder.

A spidery crack in the glass echoes loudly as Coyote took his first shot, hitting the helmet dead center, and the slime gives a great bellow, loud enough to shake Dragonfly’s balance momentarily. It swung for him again, but he dashes to its other shoulder, letting the fist smash into the fishbowl. Dragonfly’s eyes widened as he saw the solution in the webby pattern of breaks in the helmet. 

“Coyote! Weaken the glass!” he shouted into his hand, and Coyote nodded vigorously, seeing the plan as well. He popped another four shots into the helmet, spreading the cracks all around the front. Inevitably, it goes in for another swing, and Dragonfly dodged yet again, pulling a second weapon off of his back: a long golden sword. He stabs it into the already-softened glass, weakening it further. Knuckles hit the middle of the five gunshots and slashes, and finally smash through the bowl entirely. Again, the creature roared, but this time its huge body crashed into the road, motionless save for the slime oozing its way out of the helmet. 

As the space suit fell, Dragonfly lost his balance on its shoulder. Coyote jumped to his rescue, sliding out underneath his falling body just in time to catch him in his arms. 

“I’m not all that useless, am I?” he grinned and set the blushing dragon back on his feet as he sheathed the sword and draws back the string of his bow again. Words bubbled to his lips as the awful sticky beast makes to jump upon and eat them, drooling more stars than are visible in the city sky. 

“Ryuu ga waga teki wo kurau!” 

The arrow formed by the shout was engulfed in a magnificent blue flame, and from it burst forth two mystical dragons much like the Kwami he had met earlier. They rushed at the slime and dove down its throat, ripping it to shreds like it was paper rather than a gelatinous beast. It melted away with a faint shriek, and to the heroes’ surprise, a young boy remained unconscious on the ground where it had vanished. 

Dragonfly dashed forwards and lifted the child’s head into his lap - he could feel weak breath on his wrist. The boy had simply fallen asleep from the exertion. 

When he looked up from the crumpled body, he’s amazed to find that his dragons had not only freed the boy, but repaired the extensive damage he had done; the school roof, high rise windows, even the dents in the school field were as good as new. 

“Mighty useful trick that is, doll,” Coyote whistled, sauntering up behind Dragonfly and the boy as the dragons came to rest by his sides, fading into a soft blue mist. He could almost hear the man scowl as he comes closer.

“I am not your ‘doll’,” the dragon rose to his feet and thrust the child at Coyote. “Take this boy somewhere safe."

Coyote nodded, grabbing the kid under his armpits and hiking him up on his hip. Dragonfly turns away, making to leave.

“Hey, wait!” Coyote whined. “You gotta tell me your name, at least, partner!” The raven-haired serpent sighed in defeat.

“You may call me Dragonfly,” he said with a tiny smile, then took a running leap and scaled the face of one of the newly-repaired buildings.


	2. The Gopher

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Coyote and Dragonfly learn more about the evil they are facing, and fight a tiny new villain who gives them a lot more trouble than expected - Coyote finally has a chance to use his own power.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm so tired,,, i figured i'd have to force myself into an update schedule to keep this monster going, so here it is.

As soon as Coyote was out of sight, Hanzo felt his transformation ripple down his body like fish scales, leaving him collapsed on his knees in the grass behind the school building. His nails dug into the turf as Toyoll floated up to his shoulder, dropping limp in a similar state of exertion. Hanzo took a moment of silence, focusing on steadying his breath, until Toyoll interrupted the peace with a squeal - it was more fitting of a rodent than an elegant dragon, but Hanzo wasn’t one to judge.

“You did fantastic!” It gushed, flipping over onto its back as Hanzo fell to rest against the building. “Natural as could be. I knew you were the right choice,” Hanzo could feel his ears turning pink with the compliments, but a smile stretched his lips all the same as he knocked his head backwards into the brickwork. 

“Thank you,” he laughed quietly, he could still feel his fingers shaking in disbelief as he mulled the past hour - he had leapt upon a building, taken down a supervillain, and saved a child from a horrible fate as a slimy monster. Certainly not hobbies of his back in Hanamura, but he supposed that a new home called for trying new activities, at least. “I wish you would have mentioned the partner in your little explanation,” he poked at the dragon’s tiny horns with a pinkie. The beard and mane around its head were silky-soft, scales wrapping its lithe body like velour. A little puff of steamy breath from its snout brushed Hanzo’s skin as he stroked its head. 

“My apologies,” Toyoll yawned, scratching harmlessly at Hanzo’s thumb. “I forgot about him. A bit garish, isn’t he?” The boy thought back to the cherry-tinted leather coat, royal blue bandana strung scamp-like around his neck, and the musk of a reliable old dog when he had been close enough to catch a whiff. 

“I would call that an understatement,” Hanzo pursed his lips and willed his wobbly legs to stand him back on his feet. “I am rather curious as to who is behind that mask of his,” he admitted, and Toyoll gave a lock of his long bangs a sharp tug. “Ow!”

“No! Neither of you are ever to reveal your secret identities, even to each other!” its tone became serious as it stalked down Hanzo’s arm, landing in his cupped palms. For a moment, it reminded him of his own sprint across the monster’s arm, but then he tuned back into Toyoll’s lesson. “If you tell Coyote who you are, what do you think will happen if he’s turned into a monster himself? The Reaper will know who you are-”

“Reaper?” Hanzo interrupted, then bowed his neck as the tiny dragon shot him an icy glare.

“The Reaper is a powerful evil force. He was behind the monster you fought today, and will control all those you face in the future.”

“More!” the boy cried in disbelief. “I thought this was a one time thing!”

“Of course not,” Toyoll chuckled, chasing itself into a comfortable spool atop Hanzo’s palms. The fur of its tail tickled his pale skin. “Now that he knows you and Coyote will be protecting this city, he’ll likely come after you.”

“Why us?”

“You remember that lovely ribbon, the one in your hair?” the dragon sighed as he inspected the glint of the metallic fabric in sunlight from afar. Hanzo nodded. “That is your Miraculous, your link to me and the only way to transform into Dragonfly. You must protect it with your life - if the Reaper got his claws on it, he would be unstoppable.”

“What does he want?” Hanzo shifted his Kwami into one hand and reached up to cup his Miraculous protectively with the other.

“Hard to say, but at the moment...” Toyoll slipped its tiny golden eyes shut. “I would imagine that his spirit seeks vengeance against those who wronged him, and that he’s content to destroy until he gets it.” A shudder ran down Hanzo’s spine, even under his jacket in the beating New Mexican sun. The lack of concrete motive made him more uncomfortable than it should have - the absolutely demolished buildings, the hole in the roof of the school, all for nothing but a grudge. He would hate to have to face him, the puppet master, in the flesh. He tucked Toyoll into the deep pocket of his coat and made for the back door of the building. 

“Hanzo!” the dragon suddenly popped its head over the hem of the pocket, bidding him pause. “I nearly forgot to mention! After you’ve used your power, you only have five minutes before you de-transform. Use them wisely!” It warned, scrabbling little claws into his side.

“I’ll try my best,” Hanzo sighed and gave the beastie’s head a light stroke, coaxing it back into his pocket. 

When Hanzo slipped inside the school building, he wasn’t all that surprised to find the hallways empty. His light steps echoed from the high ceilings, and he casually drifted until he was walking on the side, rather than barrelling down the middle. The fluorescent lights were still out, though he was sure he must have repaired the power lines along with the school itself. Mismatched white tiles beneath were lit only by the intermittent windows perched between rows of lockers.

The door to his classroom was locked, and he cursed his own foolishness - the school was empty. Nobody had seen him, besides maybe his little Kwami, but a flush burned his cheeks all the same as he ducked his head and pushed one of the heavy front doors open, back out into the sunlight. 

Outside, a little flash of green caught his eyes as Genji dashed up the steps two at a time to meet him at the doors. He was bouncing, sneakers scraping the concrete. 

“There you are! Where did you sneak off to, brother?” he wrapped Hanzo in a tight hug as he greeted him with a mushed shout in Japanese, grabbing at his hands. Toyoll squirmed in his pocket and he pulled back from Genji’s body in sympathy, giving the Kwami more air to breathe. 

“I was...” Hanzo began, avoiding Genji’s eyes. Certainly he couldn’t reveal that he was the masked vigilante that had taken down the creature - he wasn’t exactly a fan of superhero stories, but even he knew the importance of a secret identity. His brother looked expectant, raising his eyebrows with every passing second that Hanzo didn’t respond. “A-asleep!” Hanzo’s voice trembled as he spit the excuse, hiding his mouth behind a hand and curling in on himself - nobody would believe that he had slept through a monster attack.

“You passed out!” Genji bellowed, laughing from deep in his chest. “I should’ve known, you wuss!”

“Passed... Out...” Hanzo repeated in disbelief as Genji doubled over onto his knees. Bitterness tinged his sigh. “Yes. I passed out.” So much for appreciation.

“I was awake for the whole thing,” his brother boasted, gluing his fists to his hips and puffing out his chest. “That thing’s huge hand was right in front of the window, too!” Hanzo neglected to mention that the creature’s face had been pressed right up against his classroom, breathing acid steam against its helmet as its soulless eyes stared him down. 

“You’re so brave, brother,” Hanzo rolled his eyes and crossed his arms over his chest. 

“Did you see the superheroes, at least?” Genji was back to hopping in place, excitement hardly contained. 

“Superheroes?” Hanzo wasn’t the best actor in the world, and he knew it. He practically drooled sarcasm, but Genji was far too enthralled to notice. He launched into a loud spiel in their native tongue, and Hanzo was glad that he had not chosen English - his words were embarrassingly childish. 

“You should’ve seen them! They had magic powers and everything!” Genji gushed, balling his fingers into fists. “One of them was a dragon, Hanzo! A dragon!” Hanzo chuckled quietly as he watched his brother’s glee play out in front of him with wide gestures and loud words. It was hard to imagine any more expression, but he was sure Genji could manage it, given the right trigger - how would he react if he found out that his quiet brother was this magic dragon he fairly idolized?

\--

“Oh, sweet Jesus,” Jack looked mortified, sweating through his cotton dress shirt as he loosened his tie and rolled up his sleeves. Coyote tried his best not to chuckle at the sight as he held the sleeping child, curled peacefully up against his slick leather coat. He was pretty strong on his own, but transformed he was hardly breaking a sweat running around with a 100 pound kid in his arms. Pretty incredible, he thought as he hefted Winston up into the principal’s waiting hands. 

“Is he okay?” the blonde worried, pressing a thick finger to the child’s neck, searching for a pulse.

“He’ll be fine, J-,” Coyote cut himself off, mid eye-roll at the blonde’s fretting. How many people called the school principal by his first name? No matter what he did, Jesse was sure Morrison could find a way to spin it on him and land him in detention again, or worse. He’d threatened suspensions plenty, but had luckily never dished one out. “He’ll be fine, sir.” 

Coyote could feel Jack’s eyes on him as he scampered away, bounding atop the newly-repaired school roof. His getaway had to be cool and mysterious, or what was the point? As he rolled out his momentum in the gravel of the rooftop, he shed his transformation. It felt a little like stripping himself of a sweaty shirt in the summer, and for a moment he wished he could do just that. With a pant, the little dog-Kwami scrambled into his lap from the burning surface of the roof.

“Why’d you have to come up here to do that!” Wenndi howled, scratching at its overly-warm stomach with a hind leg. Jesse laughed and threw his head back, holding his hat steady. He ignored the Kwami’s moans and griping as he stood, brushing gravel from the seat of his jeans and wiping a slick of sweat from his forehead. Wenndi clung to his undershirt with its curved little claws, climbing it like a kitten on a drape until he could comfortably wriggle into Jesse’s breast pocket. 

“Did you see the way Dragonfly took that thing down?” he gave a low whistle, tucking his thumbs into the pockets of his jeans as he headed for the shade of the doorway back inside the school. “He was incredible.”

“Yeah, yeah, Dragonfly is great, whatever,” Wenndi sighed. “We were cool too!” he could hear a pout in the dog’s voice.

“More than just cool,” Jesse stuck two fingers into Wenndi’s little pocket, fishing it out with a toothy grin. “We did amazing.”

“Dragonfly couldn’t have purified the monster if you didn’t catch him,” the dog grinned back, squirming happily as Jesse scratched its soft underbelly. 

“Purified... Is that what he did? Can I do that?” Jesse interrupted himself with a gasp, raising Wenndi to eye level. “Do I get to call demon coyotes?”

“That’s ridiculous,” Wenndi rolled its eyes. “Your power will make a monster vulnerable. Break its armor, kind of,” the Kwami made a breaking motion with its paws. “But you can’t return them to human form, or fix the damage they’ve caused.”

“Oh,” Jesse huffed a surprised sigh. “That’s pretty neat, I guess.”

“It is neat!” Wenndi whined indignantly. “If you like Dragonfly so much, why don’t you just switch Kwamis with him?”

“Hey, hey!” the cowboy scratched under the dog’s chin. “I never said you weren’t just as good! Besides, archery ain’t really my style...” As Wenndi rubbed up against his fingers, he thought back to learning to shoot, the fancy silver revolver his guardian had given to him for protection after it was clear he needed it, if he was gonna run with Deadlock. His association with the gang had begun to fade when the man had suddenly died under suspicious circumstances, but the leaders were none too happy. He avoided the outskirts of town, now, knowing they were not brazen enough to confront him at school or in the busy city center. With the cat-like dog in his palm, now, he thought that maybe he didn’t need to be so scared of them anymore. 

“Good,” the jealous little creature made its way back to Jesse’s pocket, settling back inside. 

“Do you know who Dragonfly is?” Jesse murmured curiously, shushing Wenndi as he began to complain again. “I’m just curious, honest!”

“Couldn’t tell ya if I wanted to,” the pup smirked, shifting into a more comfortable position. “He was chosen after you - it’s better if you don’t know, anyway. Safer.” the boy gave a disappointed sigh as he finally clicked the door back into the school open. 

Down on the ground floor again, he found himself right back outside after realizing the school was empty. The stairs were mostly abandoned, besides the pair of boys he had seen in Jack’s office the day before. One was bright and sunny, babbling in some language he hadn’t a hope of identifying. If the taller one’s wide movements and hand gestures were anything to go by, though, he might have a bit of expertise in the subject matter. Silently, he crept behind the shorter one, the one that had rejected him in the office, as he was too amused to notice. With a quick intake of breath, settling his chin above his shoulder, he spoke as loud as he could:

“Howdy, boys.” The raven-haired one jumped a solid foot into the air, flailing his arms in panic until he swiveled on his toes to find Jesse behind, who greeted his flaming glare with a curt tip of his hat. The green-haired one stopped his explanation and burst out into a fit of laughter as his brother fumed, red from the tips of his ears to his trembling fingertips. “I don’t believe we’ve been properly introduced, hm?” He offered a hand to the older one, who promptly turned his back to it, hunched over and still pink from his scare. The other eagerly bounded over to give it a hearty shake, though.

“I’m Genji!” he grabbed onto his brother by his jacket sleeve and tugged him to unwillingly face the cowboy, too. “This is Hanzo - don’t let his height fool you, he’s the older one,” Genji snickered as Hanzo gave his hand a swat.

“It’s barely a few centimeters,” Hanzo murmured unhappily, crossing his arms over his chest. 

“Name’s McCree, but y’can call me Jesse. I always liked shorties, anyway,” Jesse stuck out a taunting peek of tongue, and Hanzo scoffed. Ignoring the unpleasant look on his face, Jesse continued from where he had meant to butt into their conversation, initially. “Rough first day this musta been, huh?”

“Rough? It was so cool!” Genji gushed, dropping right back into his enthusiastic tirade. “It’s like we’re in a comic book!”

“Guess that ain’t so far from the truth,” McCree chuckled, scratching at the wisp of beard on his jaw. “That Dragonfly was really somethin’.”

“Dragonfly?” Genji and Hanzo asked together, Genji’s eyes widening in excitement and Hanzo sounding like he had swallowed a lump of bile. Jesse realized his mistake and bit his lip.

“Yeah! Coyote and Dragonfly, that’s what they were called, right?” he turned the question to them, hoping they didn’t press any further. Genji seemed satisfied, nodding vigorously. Hanzo looked a little green. He mumbled something in another language in his brother’s ear, and Genji pouted back, whining something back in the same language. McCree was starting to feel a little uncomfortable, watching them argue when he couldn’t understand a word of it. “Where’re you guys from, anyway?” he queried, hoping to soothe the spat. 

“Hanamura, in Japan. We just moved in yesterday,” Genji ignored Hanzo’s mystery pleas, in what Jesse now understood must have been Japanese. His face lit up all of a sudden and he grabbed onto Hanzo’s right arm under his sleeve. “Our family has a history with dragons, just like Dragonfly! Maybe father could know something?” He asked aloud, and Hanzo shook his brother’s hands off of him, shaking his head.

“Don’t be absurd!” he sputtered, thrusting his hands roughly into his jacket pockets and then recoiling slightly as his knuckle brushed something. “Genji, we are going home! Now!” So that was what they had been arguing about.

“I can walk y’all back, if-” Jesse began to offer, but was cut off by an acidic hiss.

“No! We can get home just fine on our own, thank you!” the thanks was artificial and followed by a roll of the brunette’s eyes as he dragged his startled brother towards their home, leaving Jesse standing dumbfounded from the top of the stairs.

\--

“Hanzo, you didn’t have to be so rude to him!” Genji whined loudly once the school was out of earshot, and Hanzo huffed without words in reply, brows still furrowed in frustration. He had enough to deal with, at the moment - a flirty delinquent and his nosy brother were not issues he wanted to add to his list. “C’mon, he’s cute!” his little brother laughed. That he may be, but Hanzo had had enough of the unsolicited flirting. 

“I don’t feel well,” Hanzo mumbled in reply. He did feel a tad nauseous, almost having his secret exposed so quickly. Maybe it would be best to avoid Jesse, even Genji if he continued to obsess over his dragonic alter-ego. Genji gave a hum of sympathy, the best sound Hanzo had heard since waking. 

Arriving back at the apartment, they found the omnic tidying up the living space calmly. Genji plopped himself onto the couch and powered up the television, straight onto exactly the type of news story Hanzo dreaded hearing. A student inside the school had caught some amateur footage of his and Coyote’s battle with Winston, and it was plastered upon the full expanse of the screen; Genji squealed with delight. Watching himself clad in that ridiculous costume, decked with a tail and horns, even, deepened the color of his cheeks, but he could see what his brother was so amazed about. If he forgot who he was seeing, Dragonfly was incredible, cool and collected as he used the monster’s own force to tear it apart. With a defeated sigh, he lolled into his bedroom and collapsed on the unmade bed - the omnic hadn’t reached his room, it seemed. 

“Haven’t you slept enough, brother?” Genji called from the parlor, but Hanzo was already unconscious.

\--

The scratch of a pencil against paper rang pleasantly in Lena’s hand; she was beyond relieved when school had been called off on account of the building being torn up by a giant. Extra time to work on her project was exactly what she needed, no matter how the means she got it. She hummed happily as she sketched along a sheet of posterboard, but was interrupted by the buzz of her phone on the desk. Still drawing with one hand, she reached for it and answered. 

“Lena! Are we still on for lunch?” A cheery voice greeted her.

“Lunch... Lunch?” She clicked her tongue, racking her memory: no, she didn’t recall setting up lunch with anyone. 

“Oh, come on! We agreed last week, remember? After you skipped out on Friday?” The girl on the other end was now significantly less cheerful.

“Right, right! Sorry ‘bout that...” Lena chuckled, leaning into her desk. “‘Fraid today’s not too good for me, either-”

“Not this again!” The girl cried in frustration, and Lena paused. “You’re such a ditz sometimes!”

“Sorry...” Lena mumbled, hurt. She gave her wall calendar a glance, and her stomach sank. Not only was the lunch date listed, but she had promised to help Lucio with his recording later that day. 

“What time am I picking you up?” The phone demanded, disliking being ignored.

“Uh...” The petite girl bit her lip. If she paused to go out, she would have to work late into the night to make up for lost time on the assignment, especially with Lucio-

“I’ll be there at two,” she was informed curtly, and the other line hung up. 

“Oh...” Lena scrunched her brows. She checked the clock - 1:45. If they ate fast and she got some work in before meeting with Lucio, she could still finish. Leaping to her feet and bounding to her closet to get ready, she was interrupted yet again by her phone. Sighing, she picked up, assuming it was the same friend.

“Lena?” Before she could hurriedly confirm the lunch, she paused at the familiar soft voice. 

“Emily!” She slowed to a halt, smile touching her eyes as she listened to the tinkle of her girlfriend’s airy laugh. They hadn’t seen each other in months, not since Emily’s transfer student program had brought her to London, ironically enough. 

“I heard about what happened today! Are you alright?” the concern in Emily’s voice was sweet and sincere, and Lena sighed happily. 

“I’m fine, don’t worry about me,” she assured.

“Could we video chat tonight?” Emily seemed eager. They hadn’t had a proper call in weeks, and Lena’s gut dropped to her toes. She didn’t have time, but there was no way that she could deny Emily’s heartfelt request.

“S-sure, babe,” she scratched at the back of her neck anxiously, and as Emily replied happily with a time she was free, her phone buzzed yet again - rapidly, multiple times. Lowering it from her ear, she found a multitude of new texts among her messy inbox. One from Lucio, confirming the time for her to come over and help with his recording - she cringed. Three more, from her parents. As she clicked through them, she nearly fell to her knees. They wanted her to babysit.

Wishing Emily a good night and hanging up, Lena muffled a frustrated groan with pursed lips. Friends, relationships, they were too stressful sometimes. She tried so hard to remember things and schedule them properly but -

“Wouldn’t it just be easier to be everywhere at once?” An eerie voice, gravelly and deep, asked from behind her eyes. 

“Great, now I’m going crazy...” She mumbled, wiping a tear from her eye. Suddenly, she reached for her neck, scratching at her own thin flesh as a tightness froze her throat.

\--

Hanzo awoke the next morning with a dry mouth. He licked his lips as he rolled from his bed, stumbling on his feet. Light shone brightly through the balcony window, indicating that it was early afternoon - school must have been cancelled again. Leisurely, he strolled his way out to the living room - Genji was nowhere to be seen, surprisingly, and he flipped on the television. As it flickered on, he was greeted with a still photo of Dragonfly, followed by a live feed of downtown, where Coyote was locked in a vicious battle. Hanzo yawned as he watched the hero valiantly fight back at least a dozen child-sized rat creatures. The news camera also managed to get a close glimpse at the leader of the gopher-henchmen: a petite girl, barely human sized, clad in orange goggles that made her eyes look massive and curled teeth like her servants; she laughs in amusement as her animals destroy the town from a million places at once, leaving buildings and homes in piles of rubble. Coyote seemed to be alone, and the beasts, small as they were, would overwhelm him eventually.

“Where’s the other one?” Hanzo murmured in a sleepy confusion. He faintly remembered meeting Coyote, and there was one other hero, wasn’t there? As more of the previous day collected in his tired mind, he remembered the school roof, the monster, Coyote catching him. Or had he caught Dragonfly? No, Dragonfly was the other hero... He was Dragonfly.

He was the other hero.

The sleep rushed from Hanzo’s eyes as he tumbled to his feet with a yelp, scrambling back to his room, but his tiny Kwami was nowhere to be found. He heard a lazy knock at his door and threw it open to find Genji’s surprised face.

“Brother! You’re awake, finally,” he chuckled, and held up his cupped palms in offering. “I found this little toy in my jewelry, figured it might be yours.” Down he looked, and in Genji’s pink palms, looped in thin gold chains and a few rings was Toyoll’s lifeless body. 

With hardly a thanks, he snatched the tiny dragon up with a low squeal of disbelief, shoving Genji out and ignoring his cries of “Rude!”. He turned it over in his hand with mumbled exclamations of disbelief - power-granting beasts weren’t pets, but he had somehow managed to kill what seemed to be an ancient magical creature faster than a toddler could kill their first goldfish! Had he forgotten to feed it, had it been attacked -

Toyoll rolled over onto its stomach.

“Your brother dresses well,” it yawned nonchalantly, stretching like a tiny cat. Hanzo’s mouth hung open. The Kwami watched him for a moment, unamused. “Are you trying to catch flies, Hanzo?” With a flush, he closed his mouth.

“I thought you had died!” he cried, wrapping the dragon tight in his fingers like a little hug. 

“Of course not,” it chuckled and wriggled itself out of Hanzo’s grip. “It wouldn’t do to have your brother find our little secret already, now would it?” He shook his head in agreement, then remembered why he had searched for Toyoll in the first place. 

“There’s something attacking the city! We need to go help Coyote!”

“Well, you know the magic words,” the dragon smirked as Hanzo gave his chin a last fond tickle.

“Transform me!”

\--

By the time Dragonfly arrived downtown - he’d finally started to get good at leaping from roof to roof - Coyote was a mess. The serpent found him battered and bruised, kicking desperately as the rodent-henchmen closed in on him. He panted like a dog, but managed a face-splitting grin when he spotted his partner landing on the roof by his side. 

As far as Dragonfly could tell, the actual villain was nowhere to be found in the little skirmish. She had scampered off to hide while her servants did the grunt work with them - cowardly. Unsheathing the elegant curve of his sword, a few deep slashes were enough to neutralize the gophers on the roof, and Coyote whistled in relief. 

“I apologize for arriving so late,” Dragonfly gave a curt bow of his neck, and Coyote waved a hand in forgiveness, collapsing backwards comically, winded. 

“Ain’t no trouble, sugar,” he sighed, sounding satisfied. “What kept ya?”

“I...” Dragonfly looked to the ground, finding the golden tips of his metal boots. “I slept in...” 

Coyote chuckled, but didn’t mention it again. 

“They’ll return for us soon. Let’s get you somewhere safer,” Dragonfly clenched a fist around Coyote’s metal wrist, and his partner slipped out of his grip, only to replace it with his flesh hand, dressed in the same warm cola-colored leather of his jacket. The dog-like ears perched on his stetson and wagging tail sprouting from under his jacket were more expressive than Dragonfly’s own stationary horns, but the little grin on his mouth said everything - he was delighted to see his partner.

“Whatever you say,” Coyote kept up quite well as Dragonfly leapt from the roof to a balcony on a nearby hotel, then climbed the brickwork, digging his sharp claws into the stone. A few similar movements brought them atop a tall apartment high-rise, and Dragonfly spied a hiding place: a wide greenhouse topped with solar panels and bursting with greenery of all kinds. The rodents were chewing intermittently at the base of the building, but the roof seemed clear enough. They ducked inside the little glass box, and Dragonfly helped Coyote lower himself to the ground among shed petals and leaves. 

His breath was heavy, and he leaned his head back against a table sporting plant boxes. Dragonfly couldn’t help but pant as well in the humid air. Coyote reached up to remove his cowboy hat, and they both seemed surprised to realize his charming ears were not an attached accessory, but nestled atop his skull, among his messy chestnut locks. Coyote gave them a scratch. The knees of his jeans and leather boots were scuffed from his brawl, and his chest heaved beneath his jacket and the straps over his torso. Dragonfly glanced downward. Around Coyote’s waist was a sturdy belt with a humorously large golden buckle - it bore a set of sharp doggish teeth framing a lolling tongue. Garish.

“What do you know so far about the villain?” Dragonfly turned his attention elsewhere, running his eyes over elegant hanging planters draped with vines and flowers. 

“To be honest...” Coyote sighed. “Not much. Every time I get close to ‘er, she just disappears and shows up somewhere else, kinda like teleporting.” he chewed his cheek. “Not that I got very close in the first place. Those rats of hers are tough lil’ buggers.” the cowboy raised his arm to reveal deep clawed gouges in the leather of his sleeve, similar to ones in his boots. Dragonfly acknowledged the information with a hum. 

“Can’t you just take care of ‘em with that magic dragon spell of yours?” Coyote looked up to Dragonfly expectantly. Dragonfly rolled his eyes with a chuckle.

“It’s not a spell,” he thought back to the phrase he had shouted before the spirits had reduced the previous day’s slime monster to a child and repaired an entire city block effortlessly. “It’s a purification. The words mean, ‘let the dragon consume you’.” They gobbled up the evil Reaper’s control on the victim and reversed his damage.

“How’d’ya know?” Coyote cocked a brow. The words had sounded like gibberish to him.

“It was spoken in my native tongue,” as if to prove it, he stuck the tip of his out. “Japanese.”

“Oh,” Coyote scratched the back of his neck. “Guess that makes sense.”

“I’m sure the spirits would not have an issue with removing such a pest, small as she is.”

“Great!” the exhausted Coyote sighed in relief, leaning further back into the plants tickling his cheeks. “Just gimme a minute to rest up, yeah?”

\--

“Ryu ga waga teki wo kurau!” Dragonfly shouted the same words, and the same dragons appeared from his arrow, magnificent and terrifying all at once. He fired from the roof of the apartments, Coyote stood behind him, fending off the little beasties as they clawed their way up to interfere. Two twining spirits rushed their way around the city, curling between buildings and into the sky as they searched for the villain: she dodged every swipe. 

The two heroes watched with growing unease as the dragons successfully repaired the buildings and roads, but the damage was just as quickly replaced by the little gophers. As for their master, she blinked through the air in little bursts, away from the dragons’ snouts without trouble. Eventually, the frustrated spirits disappeared, and Dragonfly heard a tiny beep near his ear. 

“Well, that didn’t work,” Coyote huffed, disappointed. Reaching back towards the beep, Dragonfly noticed one of the delicate fishscale emblems on his Miraculous had vanished, disappeared from the silk. “What next?” 

“I...” Dragonfly began, eyes widening. Toyoll’s warning: he had only five, now four, minutes before his transformation wore off and his secret identity was exposed. “I have to go! Now!”

“Go! You just got here!” Coyote whined, kicking the last of the current wave of creatures away from their roof, but another horde was fast approaching, along with their leader - there was a nasty glint in her goggled eyes that neither of them liked. 

“I’ve used my power! My transformation will wear off soon-” Dragonfly began, tucking his arms close to his body as he panicked, searching the roof around them for an escape. The tone of his voice pushed Coyote to comfort him, realizing the stakes.

“Hey, hey! Calm down,” Coyote shushed, seeing the frantic look in his eyes and tugging him back to their little greenhouse hideout. “You go. Rest up, change back, I’ll hold ‘em off for a little bit.” Fear was not an expression he liked mixed into his Dragonfly’s regal features. 

“Will you be alright?” Dragonfly tucked a long bit of his bangs away from his face, looking up to the slightly taller boy with worry weighing his dark eyes.

“I’ll be fine,” Coyote assured, and pushed him gently towards the back entrance of the little shed. “Just try to hurry, okay?” The serpent nodded, creasing his brows when he heard little claws scrabbling at the glass doors. Coyote bit his lip and brought his revolver from its holster on his hip, turning to face the impending attack. 

The doors shattered in a meteor shower of broken glass, and Coyote nailed the first rodent between its beady eyes, felling it instantly. He does the same to the second, and Dragonfly couldn’t help but admire his marksmanship as he slipped out the back. One final glance backwards and three are down, but another beep sounded next to his ear. 

\--

Dragonfly’s chin collided with the rug sprawled over his bedroom floor in the very moment that his transformation wore off. Toyoll tumbled along the ground, and Hanzo leapt after its tiny body, catching the Kwami before it rolled under the dresser. It looked exhausted, panting with glowing yellow eyes barely able to flutter open.

“How soon can we transform back?” he demanded, then covered his own mouth in shame at his own rudeness. “S-sorry...”

“Give me ten minutes, at least,” the dragon yawned, and Hanzo stood, placing it delicately atop his pillow, warmed from the sunshine. It sank in deeply and Hanzo could almost have sworn he heard a purr along with the little stretch it gave. “I could use a cup of tea, if you don’t mind...”

“Of course,” Hanzo bowed at the neck, clicking the door shut quietly behind him as he hurried towards the kitchen. His own body was as lethargic and sluggish as Toyoll’s, but he worked through the burn - Coyote would only be able to last so long on his own. He rushed to prepare two cups of instant green tea, not too hot, so they wouldn’t have to wait for it to cool. As he worked, he clicked the television on from the remote on the counter. The news was still following the gopher attack, and the narrator was wondering aloud where Dragonfly had disappeared to. Had he snuck off for some surprise attack? Or had the serpent abandoned his partner, left him to defend the city alone like a coward? He alone knew the answer; even Coyote might have thought that he had been left to die. 

When the tea was mixed, he brought the two cups back to his room, setting one on the nightstand and crossing his legs as he sat on the bed with the other between his hands. Toyoll wriggled around on the pillow, and Hanzo picked him up gently, placing him down next to the cup with the sigh of a tired mother. 

“You shouldn’t be so frivolous with your power,” Toyoll murmured tiredly after taking a long sip of the lukewarm green liquid. “Save it until you’ve subdued your foe - it can’t do everything for you, you know.” 

“I’m sorry,” Hanzo hung his head,

“It’s fine, you’re doing fine,” the dragon took another deep drink. “It’s only your second battle, of many.”

“Mm,” Hanzo hummed into his cup, replaying the memory of his own departure. Coyote had steeled himself against the enemy, determined to watch Dragonfly’s back as he escaped. He didn’t think he could ask for a more loyal partner. 

“I don’t want you to rely on me to defeat your foes,” Toyoll drew his attention as it straightened its noodle-like body, “But I do have some useful information.”

“Ah?” Hanzo made a sound of surprise. 

“Coyote has a power as well, you know. If he can get a vantage point on all of the underlings, he should be able to eliminate them,” it licked its beard free of tea as it drained the last of the cup. “As well as open your enemy to attack.” Hanzo blinked. 

“And you didn’t tell me this earlier, why?” he gritted his teeth and swallowed the last gulp of his own cup. 

“I wanted to see if you could figure it out for yourself!” the dragon whined defensively. “In hindsight, a poor plan.”

“Rotten little beast,” Hanzo cooed and slipped his fingers under the Kwami’s stomach, lifting it into his cupped hands. “Transform me!”

\--

When Dragonfly located Coyote yet again, the sight was not pretty. Just before the hero plummeted off the edge of a hotel he’d been chased atop, the dragon landed next to him and grabbed him by the scruff of his jacket. 

“Oh, darlin’,” Coyote breathed weakly as his partner dragged him back to his feet and drew his sword. “Ain’t never been so happy to see someone in my whole life.” Dragonfly smirked at the comment as Coyote collapsed to the ground, boneless and tired out. He slashed right through the first row of gophers, and more stepped up to take their place: they meet a similar fate. 

“Coyote!” he shouted above the squeak ad squabble of his opponents. 

“Yeah, honey?” Coyote whimpered back, chest heaving up and down as he finally took a well-deserved breather. 

“Are you up to trying your power?”

 

“Ain’t got a clue how to use it, sug,” he panted back. “But I’ll sure as heck give it a try, if you think it’ll help.” With confirmation from his partner, Dragonfly pushed an exceptionally deep swipe of his blade, pushing the army back far enough for him to grab Coyote up by his hand and yank him off the edge of the roof he had just saved him from falling over. 

They landed softly on the crumbled road, gophers pouring over the ledge after them like a waterfall, and Dragonfly jumped up, climbing them up to a building across the street. The creatures were stuck clawing and scratching at the bricks below, and he smirked. Dumb animals. 

He had already scouted the best vantage point in the city before arriving, knowing it would be only a matter of time before the Gopher and her minions came to finish them. As Coyote finished catching his breath, they were off again, bounding across the network of rooftops and nearing the tallest hotel for miles. It was too high to leap from the rooftop, so they were forced back to the wrecked ground. As Dragonfly climbed straight up the front face, Coyote ran behind him, anchored only to his partner’s hand - the little devils were right on their ankles, there was no time to be wishy-washy about heights.

The hotel had, unfortunately, already been breached by the time they reached it. Dodging claws and little paws, Dragonfly tossed Coyote atop the sturdy industrial chimney, and they both finally stopped to take a look behind them. 

Filling the city like a sea, the creatures’ commander had drawn every last one of them out of hiding to pursue them. She herself blinked closer with each passing second, following their path across the roofs. 

“Now, Coyote!” Dragonfly gave the cowboy a light shove, and though he had remained quiet until then, his voice was deafening as power flowed through his body. His skin became exceptionally hot through his glove, but Dragonfly dared not let go.

“Draw!” Coyote shouted, like he was dueling the million grunts at once. He moved his revolver at lightning speed, bullets disappearing and reappearing in the round chamber as fast as they had vanished. The creatures fell, one by one, but not all of them were visible from the chimney. Coyote was still as a stone beside him, discounting his firing arm - it was up to him. 

Dragonfly looped his hands around Coyote’s waist, grabbing onto his belt buckle for a grip, and knelt slightly. With a deep breath, he leapt as high into the air as he could physically muster. 

Even with the movement, Coyote never missed a shot. Dragonfly clung to his solid weight, holding his breath and refusing to look back down towards the roof. The air was thinner there, and he could have sworn he felt the brush of cloud against his cheek, where his skin and scales felt damp. 

They began their descent, and Dragonfly felt his stomach drop to his toes. His ribbon and braid sailed around his face, but he could still feel his partner shooting down the army. He dared to open his eyes, and found the once-writhing mass of animal bodies nearly completely still. The last remaining opponent was the commander herself, and the expression below her goggles had morphed to absolute horror.

The last bullet seemed to move in slow motion as it exploded from the barrel of the six-shooter. It sliced the air, making its very own jet stream as it sped towards the villain’s forehead. She tried her best to retain her dodging tactics, but miraculously enough, the bullet followed. Struck squarely between the eyes, she collapsed backwards, but no blood spilled. 

Coyote and Dragonfly landed hard back on the roof, to their own surprise. Realizing the opportunity, Dragonfly was the first to rise; he drew his bow from his back and aimed across the street to where the Gopher lay still atop the opposite building. 

“Ryu ga waga teki wo kurau!” 

The dragon spirits seemed pleased as they gobbled up an enemy that had evaded them earlier. A petite, crumpled body lay where the foe had been, and the dragons swallowed up the bodies of the furry army, as well as all the damage they had done to the city and roads. 

Sighing with relief, Dragonfly looked over his shoulder to where Coyote was laying, completely spent. A smile crossed the cowboy’s lips when Dragonfly knelt over him and stroked his cheek with a gentle thumb.

“We did it.” Coyote nodded. “You’ll change back sooner, I’ll take the girl home.” A beep came from between their bodies, and Dragonfly glanced down with a snort as one of the sharp teeth carved into Coyote’s belt buckle vanished. Fitting that the most stand-offish part of his outfit would be his Miraculous...

Dragonfly made his way over to greet the girl that they had freed as she sat up, rubbing her temples.

“What happened?” she moaned.

\--

As Dragonfly collapsed into his bedroom for the second time that day, the door opened. Barely a second out of his costume, Hanzo dunked Toyoll under his blankets.

“Hanzo!” Genji grinned as he saw his brother sitting stiffly atop his bed. “Do you want to watch a movie? I found-”

“No, no thank you,” Hanzo shook his head vigorously, standing to push the door closed. “I’m really tired, Genji, I just want to rest.”

“You’ve been in bed all-!” Genji didn’t get to speak his last word as the door shut into his face, and he sighed with a pout of defeat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i noticed like 3 days into writing this chapter that some people on the mchanzo discord had actually said they liked this story and i had to stop for a few minutes to lay down and cry it made my goddamn day just fyi
> 
> blease leave kudo if u enjoyed,,,  
> follow my tumblr (@burst-bomb-bitch) for art/updates!


	3. The Crusader

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Coyote cleans up the streets on the side and has a run in with Hanzo before he and Dragonfly face their most terrifying foe yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sssorry that this chapter is a little late! i had school and stuff to work on this week, i only just finished outlining on sunday... anyway! thank you guys so much for all the comments and kudos, i'd like to respond to them all but i don't wanna be super repetitive with my thank-yous and such so i'll just say here, i really really appreciate your support!! this is really my biggest undertaking ever and i'm super happy that you all are enjoying it c:

“... And they lived happily ever after,” Reinhardt gave a hearty chuckle as the young girl on his lap swooned to the cliche ending of her favorite fairy tale. A warm glow warbled over her chubby cheeks and forehead, firelight filling the den with a sleepy ambience as he rested in his oversized armchair, shrugging his leg gently. His other granddaughter, propped up against his ankle on the floor, stared deeply into the flames, blinking heavier with every passing minute.

 

“Sometimes,” she yawned, patting at her own mouth and tucking her little legs up into her stomach. “I wish I was a princess, just so I could meet a knight like that.” The younger girl on Reinhardt’s lap agreed with a clap of her stubby fingers. 

 

“You know, girls,” Reinhardt gave a deep, nostalgic sigh, ruffling the younger’s messy pigtails. “Your old grandpa used to be a mighty knight! Have I ever told you the story of how I lost my eye to a fearsome fire-breathing dragon?” He gestured to his right eye, scarred shut. 

 

“Tell us, tell us!” The girl on his foot was suddenly wide awake, scrambling up to join her sister atop his lap.

 

“It was back in Germany, many years ago,” He began, settling back into his armchair and hugging his granddaughters closer, but a scoff interrupted his sentence.

 

“Oh, please. You’ve told this story a million times, we’re all sick of it,” a boy curled into the sofa across the parlor groaned without lifting his eyes as he tapped away on his phone. “Stop being so dramatic, grandpa.”

 

“Many years ago,” he narrowed his eyes at the boy, and the older girl’s glare joined his.

 

“No one cares about ancient history! It was just one eye,” the boy finally looked up with an exaggerated sigh, rolling his own eyes. “It’s not like you’re blind, even.” The youngest girl gasped, and Reinhardt fell silent. Blind he was not, though many of his comrades had suffered that fate and worse. Compared to the rest of his battalion, he was fortunate - all of his limbs still attached and in working order, half of his vision, a mind that served him as well as a sixty-year old man’s could, but it had always brought him solace, the light in the children’s faces and their excitement as he recited the tale of heroics and bravery, honoring the friends he had lost, even if it was a tad exaggerated. 

 

“You should show a bit more respect for your elders, sonny,” he tried his best to mask his own grimace with a chuckle, twisting his knuckles against the armrest of his chair - he was just a child, he didn’t know what he was saying, there was no justice to be wrought here. His grandson sneered. 

 

“How come? They’re just gonna drop dead, anyway!” 

 

The floodgates were open. The older girl on his lap leapt to action with fists swinging, shouting mild curses as she chased her brother to his feet. He yelped as he rounded the corner with her hot on his tail, and Reinhardt sighed. He dropped his face into his large palm.

 

“Grandpa?” They tiny girl on his knee looked up from the commotion to face him. 

 

“Yes, princess?” He managed a tiny smile at the innocent blink of her big blue eyes. 

 

“I love you,” she crawled up his barrel chest to peck a tiny kiss to his scruffy white beard. “Good night.” 

 

“Good night, precious,” he gave her jaw a gentle swipe of his fingers and she clambered to the floor, toddling after her siblings. 

 

For every sweet thought of his girls’ joy, Reinhardt could not help but recall that smug stare of uncaring on the boy’s face. His gaze was drawn to the fireplace, still blazing, hot and golden. With a grunt, he forced the thought of Stuttgart and Eichenwalde from his mind; flames licking and chewing at the grassy hills of his home had no place there. 

 

“Such a shame, no regard for all you’ve done for him,” a gravelly voice, like that of a smoker’s, purred into the knight’s ear. 

 

“Who said that?” Reinhardt demanded, whipping his neck around to search behind his chair.

 

“Those who do not fear the Crusader are fools,” the voice continued, amused. “Show them.”

 

\--

 

“You’re a hell of a lot dumber than I thought, snitch,” Jesse heard a set of footsteps brush through the cold desert sand, followed by a few more as they shuffled after the leader of the pack. Someone spit at the ground and another took a deep drag from a cigarillo, cheap smoke burning Jesse’s nostrils. He tensed his back and reached up to pull down the hoodie obscuring his face in shadows. 

 

“Look pretty dumb, too,” the ringleader smirked, and he would recognize the  _ schick _ of a switchblade anywhere. He grinned from beneath the mask pasted to his cheekbones, lowering his leather-gloved hand to the holster at his hip as his opponents did the same, fingers twitching, anxious for the draw. The shadows in the dark were barely perceptible, but he could make out three fuzzy figures circling around him, shuffling in their old tennis shoes. “You think you’re some hero, comin’ out here all alone, but you’re just like that daddy’a yours.”

 

“He wasn’t my dad,” Jesse licked over his sharp fore teeth.

 

“Don’t matter. You’re gonna end up in the same sandy grave, kid,” the click of the gun was quick, but Coyote was quicker. He dove to the ground, but was careful to wait for the first deafening boom of hammer and powder before following up with a shot of his own, straight to the stomach of whoever was in the general direction the first shot had resonated from. The figure grunted and doubled over, clutching its midsection. Something dark began to wet the sand beneath Coyote’s feet. He took advantage of the shock between the other Deadlocks, nailing the one with the knife in the shoulder, another in the thigh. If he wanted to, surely he could land the shots to their faces, their hearts, anywhere he pleased, but that would make him just as despicable. Besides, a dead man couldn’t spread his warning for the rest of the gang:

 

“I ain’t your kid no more, boys. You, all of you,” he elaborated by waving the barrel of his revolver menacingly around the circle of fallen goons, squatting to meet the unfocused, glazed eyes of his first victim. “Best head for the hills. Got that? Tell everyone that Coyote don’t take kindly to trash in his hunting grounds.”

 

The thugs were silent, but Coyote knew he had made his point. As he stalked out of sight, he tucked the pleasant weight of his revolver back into its holster, knowing it had done justice that night. ‘Daddy’ would be proud.

 

He detransformed atop a slummy apartment building, jumping down to a rusted black fire escape as Wenndi gave him an earful.

 

“You can’t be so frivolous with your powers!” it panicked, swiping paws over its own ears like an old man worrying at his bald patches. 

 

“What’s frivolous about cleaning up the city?” Jesse grinned, tucking his hands into his jacket pocket. “I’m doing exactly what a hero should: making the streets safer for everyone.”

 

“Well...” Wenndi conceded. “Fine. But all of those men back there, they could figure out your secret identity! What are you gonna do then?”

 

“Them? Naw, they’re too dumb,” he chuckled and waved the concern off. “That wasn’t enough by a long shot.”

 

“But-” Wenndi began again, searching for another complaint.

 

“Calm down!” Jesse snatched it out of the air, cradling it gently in one hand. “I’m gonna get those thugs outta this town with or without you, okay?”

 

“There’s no way you could do it without me,” Wenndi scoffed, and Jesse nodded.

 

“Exactly.”

 

“As long as you’re careful...” the Kwami griped, sinking its little claws into the meat of Jesse’s palm.

 

“I will be, don’t you worry,” Jesse tickled at its chin, pursing his lips as he thought back to the last person that hadn’t been careful when dealing with the gang - he did, indeed, meet a sandy grave, and Jesse regretted it every day.

 

\--

 

Stalking down the grimy fire escape and deeper into the city, back into the nicer parts of town, Jesse began to hear what sounded almost like an army - synchronized footsteps, the clash and shake of armor and weaponry. It was quiet enough to pass off as a hallucination, maybe his hearing was going, until he realized that the roads were oddly deserted - something was off. His suspicions grew the deeper he ventured until a massive tremor shook the ground beneath him, knocking him to his hands and knees. It appeared that Coyote had clocked out a few minutes too early. 

 

“Wenndi, I hope you’re not too tired,” he unbuttoned his jacket pocket and the Kwami flew out, hovering protectively over the boy’s shoulder. 

 

“I’ll be fine,” It sniffed the air. “Whatever made that earthquake has gotta be huge. You should really wait for Dragonfly.”

 

“Who jealous of Dragonfly now, huh?” Jesse teased, but sobered up as an aftershock bumped him onto his ass. Wenndi snickered. “Alright, alright. Transform me!”

 

Warmth washed over his limbs and he felt the familiar weight of his six-shooter resting against his thigh - he was really growing to love that thing. With a tip of his hat over his mask and a slight adjustment to his heavy belt buckle, Coyote was off, leaping for a wrought-iron balcony and clawing his way up the building; he had to find some way to get around without Dragonfly carrying him up walls, it was beginning to eat at his ego. 

 

From atop the roof, he could see smoke and dust billowing from a street a block over - the villain appeared to be setting fires. Coyote grimaced as he took a running leap and cleared the street below, kicking up gravel as he landed on the flat roof of the opposite building. Peeking over the edge, he finally got his first glimpse at the villain. Wenndi had been right, he was huge - a massive knight, suited in heavy, clanking armor, over half the height of the five-story buildings lining the streets. A thick helm covered most of his head, but his face was visible through the front, an old looking man with a white beard and only one eye. Behind him marched a battalion of civilians, adults and children alike, clothed in their pajamas and slippers as he commanded them forwards with a burning sconce as tall as he was clutched in his chainmail sausage-fingers. 

 

“Using innocents as soldiers?” Coyote cringed. “That’s pretty low, for such a tall guy.” He wished Dragonfly had beat him there, if only to hear his joke - he gave himself a well-deserved chuckle. Before he could pat himself on the back any further, the massive knight suddenly turned his head upwards, glaring at him with one dead eye and a smirk.

 

“Low, you say?” his voice was booming, so much so that it knocked Coyote back from the edge with its sheer volume - the accent was heavy and German. Most of the buildings in the city were quake-proofed, but even that could only put up with so much of this guy. “My hearing isn’t what it used to be, sonny, would you mind speaking up?” He raised his torch and hurled a ball of fire from the flaming end, it hurtled through the air towards where Coyote stood frozen to the roof. He barely rolled out of the way in time and it singed the fur on the edge of his mangy tail as he stumbled over the edge of the building with a shout. Another close call, but he managed to hook onto the edge of a porch, pulling himself up to safety and thanking his gym teacher for the mandatory pull-ups all those years ago. He pressed himself against the sliding door, taking a moment to catch his breath.

 

The blue curtain behind the door was thrust aside and the door popped open. 

 

“What are you doing out here?” 

 

\--

 

Hanzo was thrust out of his sleep by the sound of a heavy thud against his window, and he toppled from his bed, tangled in sheets. Toyoll sniffled in its own slumber, blinking itself awake and leaping from the bedside table to hover over Hanzo’s shoulder. 

 

“I think that’s the fastest I’ve ever seen you wake up,” it stretched in midair like a flying cat. “What’s the occasion?”

 

“Something is outside...” Hanzo whispered, hushing the dragon. He crawled across the room to the closed curtains and lifted one corner inconspicuously so that he could look outside: he found a very familiar pair of boots and spurs. 

 

“What is it?” Toyoll asked as Hanzo panicked, dropping the curtain and jumping to his feet. “Can I eat it?”

 

“No, you cannot eat it!” Hanzo whispered aggressively, breathing becoming labored. “It’s Coyote! How could he have found me? Oh, what are we going to do?” He screeched at a miniscule volume, scratching at his own cheeks. 

 

“Let him in?” Toyoll stated like it was obvious. 

 

“B-but...”

 

“If he already knows your secret identity, you have nothing to hide,” Toyoll interrupted. Hanzo sighed and rested his cheek in his palm.

 

“I thought I was doing a good job...” He tentatively stalked back over to the curtains and hoisted them aside. He stuck his head out into the cool night air as Coyote turned to face him. “What are you doing out here?”

 

“H-Hanzo!” Coyote stammered, leaning back into the railing. “This is your place?” Realization struck as Hanzo sized up the surprise in Coyote’s eyes. 

 

“How do you know my name?” He stepped back dramatically, feigning innocence as he glanced back into his room and gestured Toyoll into his pajama pants pocket. 

 

“Ah, I...” Coyote twisted his brows as he thought. Hanzo narrowed his eyes. “It’s... It’s not important, okay?” He brushed the question off. Hanzo pursed his lips but did not interrogate him any further.

 

“Do you want to come in?” he asked instead, batting his lashes - as uncomfortable as it made him, he knew he would be better off acting starstruck than anything else. Coyote caught on and seemed to find his cool again, stepping over the threshold and scooping Hanzo’s hand into his own. 

 

“Thank you for your hospitality,” the gunslinger grinned, and Hanzo resisted rolling his eyes as he leaned in to peck a soft kiss onto his wrist. Coyote began to trail his eyes up the intricate dragon tattoo sprawling its way across Hanzo’s skin, and he stole his arm back. 

 

“It’s no problem, Coyote _ -san _ ,” he wanted to giggle at the way the dog bit his lip and groaned softly in his throat as he turned up the charm, forgetting all about the tattoo, but that would break his cover. Maybe he wasn’t great at acting, but watching Coyote react was rewarding enough to try. “So, what  _ are _ you doing here?”

 

“Who says I’m not just here to see you, princess?” Coyote laughed, and it was Hanzo’s turn to blush. “I’m surprised you haven’t noticed, but there’s a knight in not-so-shining armor outside, and I’ve got a feeling he has a taste for flame-broiled dog.” He gestured to his burnt tail. 

 

“So you’re hiding?” Hanzo snickered. “You have to wait for Dragonfly to save you?”

 

“Ain’t no shame in waitin’,” Coyote defended. “This is a two-man job.”

 

“I doubt he’ll find you if you’re cooped up in here,” Hanzo teased, giving him a soft shove towards the door. 

 

“Yeah, yeah,” Coyote let himself be walked out, “Maybe I’ll come back later? You know, after I kick this guy’s ass.” 

 

“I’d love nothing more,” Hanzo let the honey drip from his words, clasping his hands together in the crook of his neck and praying that Coyote had forgotten about him by the end of the coming battle. He grinned before disappearing to the neighbor’s balcony, climbing back upwards. When he was sure that Coyote was out of earshot, he opened his pocket to let Toyoll take a breath of fresh air. 

 

“Such a flirt, isn’t he?” Toyoll clicked his long, serpentine tongue, spiralling around Hanzo’s tattoo to sit upon his shoulder. “Well, you know what to do.”

 

“Transform me!” Hanzo demanded quietly, letting the cool feeling, rather like rolling up in fresh sheets, he thought, melt over his skin until he was Dragonfly yet again - the transformation felt less of an oddity with every passing use. He followed Coyote out of the sliding door, making sure to close it behind him so as not to arouse suspicion. 

 

Flinging himself upon the roof, he found Coyote crouched at the edge, breaking line of sight with their foe. Shingles shuffled beneath his metal toes, and Coyote looked up to shush him, pointing over the edge with his thumb. Dragonfly peered out into the street, observing the quiet, hypnotically still army and their huge leader, the knight. His flaming torch was like the sun, looking directly at it for more than a moment gave him a headache and he saw stars - it was a wonder he, and the rest of the city, for that matter, had not been woken by that alone - not to mention the sound of his footsteps and armor. 

 

“You sure showed up fast, darlin’. Any plans?” Coyote whispered as far beneath his breath as was humanly possible, but it wasn’t quite enough. 

 

“Two of you, now!” the knight bellowed, laughing heartily. “I welcome your challenge!” 

 

“Now that is just unfair,” Coyote rolled his eyes as Dragonfly covered his ears in the shock of the German’s huge voice. “Speaking of fair!” He addressed the villain himself that time, standing to his full height. “Let’s say you release all these innocent people down there, and we can have ourselves a real match!”

 

“Release my soldiers, you say?” the old man raised his empty hand to his chin in mock thought. “I’m afraid not, my boy! You should have considered fairness before challenging an army!” With a wicked grin, the man raised his torch high above his head, slamming it down into the ground just in front of their perch.

 

The building crumbled and the rubble went up in flames, almost instantly. Tremors rocked the ground. Dragonfly ducked and rolled onto the next roof, Coyote not far behind, and they both looked back in horror. 

 

“Oh my God,” Dragonfly whimpered, falling to his knees and covering his mouth with his archery glove as he felt a wave of nausea wash over his body. The knight cackled below them.

 

“You have yet to face such power. Am I correct,  _ heroes _ ?” he shouted, and Dragonfly could hardly move as he imagined Genji inside that building - had he been crushed by his own bedroom? Burned alive? Worse? Reality crashed into his body and knocked him to the ground. What had ever made him think he was cut out to face a supervillain - he couldn’t fight a mutated soldier with a thirst for real death, real destruction. Coyote behind him didn’t look all that much better, though his face was that of a boy that had seen plenty of death in his short lifetime and was displeased to see more.

 

“He killed them...” Dragonfly whispered, retching. 

 

“Killed?” the villain below responded to his quiet exclamation. “Certainly not. I am not partial to wasting manpower,” the heroes gasped as they saw where his statement was beginning to lead - the stones of rubble shifted, and the residents of the building crawled their way out, unscathed. Dragonfly screamed. “You two will finally learn the consequences of a real war.”

 

Genji wandered out of the collapsed debris, cheeks smeared with black char, but his shock of lime green hair was visible from a mile away as he drunkenly joined the swelling army of civilians. His eyes were glazed like candy, as though he couldn’t see a thing.

 

“Where’s Hanzo?” he heard Coyote wonder from behind as they watched the grim procession together. 

 

“I-I’m sure he’s down there somewhere...” Dragonfly mumbled through his fingers, feeling a tad faint as his brother slouched over to follow the villain. This knight was bad news: he needed to be taken out, and quickly. 

 

“Look out, he’s doing it again!” Coyote shouted a warning, grabbing onto Dragonfly’s wrist as he moved more sluggishly than usual from his scare. The torch came down, and they tumbled onto the next building over as their previous one met a similar fate to Hanzo’s apartment - it went up in high flames, lapping at their toes as they rolled to safety. 

 

“We need to get rid of him,” Dragonfly coughed the dust from his lungs. Coyote nodded and brought out his revolver, mimicking the quick shooting he had used to take out the Gopher’s army. Dragonfly gestured to himself and the ground - he was to be the distraction, while Coyote stunned the villain from above. The gunslinger grinned and nodded again as Dragonfly drew his thin sword and surfed down the roof shingles, landing in front of the huge man with it ready in front of him. The old man’s eyes lit up and he mimicked the position with his metal torch.

 

“Do you challenge me, young man?” the booming voice bounced between the faces of the buildings, hitting Dragonfly four times over.

 

“I do!” he cried back in reply. 

 

“A brave one you are! You shall have an honorable position in my army!” Dragonfly shuddered at the prospect. The German raised his sconce, ready to slam it down upon the hero’s tiny body, but Coyote’s voice, amplified until it almost matched that of the villain’s, interrupted. 

 

“Draw!” He fired from his silver revolver. 

 

A sudden wash of glowing blue overtook the night sky, bright enough that it felt like day.

 

When Dragonfly opened his eyes after the blinding flash, he found a massive energy shield blotting out the sky, projected from the knight’s gauntlet. The look on his aged face was sour.

 

“You are clever, I will give you that,” he spit as he retracted the shield and again raised his weapon. “But you must play fairly to beat the Crusader.” With that, he slammed the sconce into the road before him, cracking the asphalt, rippling damage out in front of him. Dragonfly barely managed to jump into the air in time to avoid the brunt of the damage, but he still fell flat on his back. He looks upwards to find a stunned Coyote, glaring holes into his revolver - his power had been denied entirely. 

 

Before the Crusader could rile up for another hit, Dragonfly climbed the face of Coyote’s building, praying silently that the knight would not hit again until he could regain his bearings as he scampered straight upwards like a terrified lizard. Just as he reached the top, he felt the solid ground collapse beneath him. Something grabbed onto his wrist, yanking him up into the air with enough momentum for him to make a dive for the next safe rooftop. He skidded to a stop, back on his feet in an instant to search for his savior - Coyote dangled precariously from a colorful planter box on the side of the high rise. They both jumped out of their skins as a wicked laugh from Crusader echoed through their sensitive ears. 

 

Dragonfly tucked and rolled onto the ground, ducking under the attack this time. Coyote let go of the box and toppled to the ground as well; Dragonfly grabbed a hold of the scruff of his jacket as he stood, disoriented. 

 

“We need to get out of here!” Dragonfly growled, sprinting for the end of the block, making to round the corner. 

 

“You will never escape from me!” Crusader shouted, lowering his stance as what seemed to be a combustion engine lit up in his suit of armor, propelling him forward until he crashed headfirst into the adjacent block of buildings; they came down around his head, but he stood, unfazed.

 

Dragonfly and Coyote kept running, not daring to look behind them as they rounded the city block. Crusader came charging past yet again, and Dragonfly took a deep breath, tossing both of their bodies limply between two brick high-rises, hardly stopping for a half second before digging his nails into the grit of one building, climbing for both of their lives. 

 

“Come out and fight!” the knight taunted, and the heroes laid as still as they could atop the roof, panting hard. “I’ll burn this whole city if I must!” Dragonfly groaned, wiping a sheen of sweat from his scaled forehead. 

 

“That guy is bad news...” he whispered, and Coyote nodded, sitting up as they heard the Crusader’s footsteps taper off into the distance. A beep interrupted their relative silence, and Coyote looked down at his belt buckle to watch the last of four carved teeth vanish from the gold plate, leaving only a drooling tongue. “Y-you’re going to change back!” Dragonfly’s eyes widened and he hopped to his feet. “You need to get out of here!”

 

“I can’t leave you alone with  _ that _ !” Coyote jerked his thumb in the direction the knight had run off to.

 

“I’ll be fine, go!” Dragonfly insisted, hair on his skin bristling as he heard another beep resonate between them. He whipped around, covering his peripheral vision with his hands. “Go, Coyote!”

 

\--

 

Jesse sighed to Dragonfly’s back, watching his anxious tail sway along the ground. 

 

“Thanks, darlin’,” he whispered as he turned to the fire door leading back down to the ground floor. Once inside the dimly lit hallway, Wenndi made its presence known from inside his jacket pocket, popping its head out into the air with its pink tongue lolling from black lips.

 

“Hurry and get us some food so we can get back out there!”

 

“Sure thing,” Jesse took the stairs two at a time, running his hands down the walls to keep from tripping until he finally reached the ground, only to stop in his tracks. The asphalt of the street was mangled, a ditch drug through the middle where Crusader had charged in, pipes and hydrants leaked water that attacked his boots the moment he set foot outside. High rises and shops alike lay in rubble, scattered across the city like ashes in the wind. He could hear the slow-moving army of hypnotized civilians somewhere near; it had truly become a warzone. He looked up to the roof of the apartments he’d just escaped, but Dragonfly was nowhere to be found. 

 

“Let’s go!” Wenndi reminded him from his pocket, and Jesse snapped out of his trance, running in the opposite direction of the damage gradient. 

 

Most storefronts were too broken and burnt for the gunslinger to even recognize whether they had once served food or not. The streets were empty, and the undamaged buildings seemed to live on peacefully, completely unaware of the chaos outside. Perhaps that was the Crusader’s game - the only ones he woke joined his army, and Coyote and Dragonfly were left cut off from any possible assistance. Seemed silly, though, when he thought of the mass destruction the knight could cause with one swing of his torch. 

 

Finally, Jesse came upon a promising sight: a small crop of food trucks, still strung up with twinkling fairy lights to attract hungry bar patrons. As he approached, however, he found most of the carts empty, abandoned by their owners. He sighed.

 

“What’cha in the mood for, Wenndi?” He asked as he eyed a taco cart with the doors left hanging open. 

 

“No! You are not going to loot a food cart!” Wenndi huffed, exasperated.

 

“Ain’t got much of a choice,” Jesse shrugged, heading closer to the orange van. “It’s miles back to the apartment, and every other place in town is smashed up somethin’ nasty.”

 

“Some hero you are,” Wenndi gave its reluctant consent as Jesse hopped inside the van. 

 

“I can’t believe you don’t trust me,” Jesse rolled his eyes, fishing his wallet from his back pocket and dropping a few bucks onto the counter. 

 

\--

 

Dragonfly heard the telltale sound of rushing air, and a sniff gave away his partner’s position. 

 

“You smell like tacos,” he turned up his nose in distaste as Coyote landed on the chimney next to him. 

 

“Yeah? You like things a little spicy, darlin’?” Coyote snickered as a heated blush overtook the cool dragon’s cheeks. “Took a while to find you.”

 

“I’ve been trying to avoid Crusader, but I tracked his migration. He’s moved outwards, towards the desert,” Dragonfly flicked a strand of hair from his eyes, tucking it behind his pointed ear. 

 

“Any plans yet?” 

 

“Well...” Dragonfly pursed his lips. “It’s risky, but I think the only course of action is to approach him from up close and use his own strength against him - like the first one, remember?”

 

“He seems like he might be a bit too smart for that,” Coyote hung his head. “But that’s the best we got, huh?”

 

“I suppose.” Dragonfly worried his bottom lip between his teeth, standing from his crouched position to search the horizon for the ever-moving path of destruction the villain had left in his wake. “You provide cover fire, and I’ll-”

 

“Wait, hold up,” Coyote knitted his brows and crossed his arms over his chest. “How come you’re the one riskin’ your life to get up close?” Dragonfly scowled like he had eaten something sour. 

 

“That was what we did last time, wasn’t it?”

 

“I’d wager a guess that Crusader is a heck of a lot more dangerous than that goo monster ever was,” Coyote shuddered at the memory of the toppled buildings, burning homes and braindead citizens. “You need to be around to clean up afterwards!” Dragonfly grunted in realization. 

 

“You think I’ll be hypnotized into his army?”

 

“I ain’t doubtin’ yer skills none, sugar, but we can’t risk that,” Coyote avoided his gaze. “Better if I do it so the city still has a chance if it don’t work.”

 

“I suppose... That makes sense,” Dragonfly conceded, tucking his arms behind his back and watching his own feet. “It’s a last resort, okay? If it does come to that, though... Thank you.” 

 

“It’s the gentlemanly thing to do,” Coyote chuckled, though Dragonfly couldn’t bring himself to scold the cowboy for his insolence - Coyote knew the very real consequences as well as he did. “Whatever we do, though, we gotta get to it. City’s gettin’ wrecked worse and worse by the minute.” Dragonfly nodded in agreement, and they leapt together in the direction of the outskirts of town. 

 

As they drew nearer and nearer to the source of the mess, the violence and damage became more pronounced. Entire blocks of sidewalk ripped from the ground and scattered in concrete chunks, hydrants pumping floods into the holes where roads, shops, and homes had once stood. They spotted Crusader in the difference, tearing a pickup truck bed from cab with his hands, and draw their revolver and bow respectively. Dragonfly closed one eye, taking a single, calculated step forward as he drew back the string of his bow and let an arrow fly. It struck Crusader in the back of his helmet, though it didn’t do them much good as he turned around to face his little distractions, plucking the shaft from his head without so much as a wince as he approached.

 

“I see you have returned, so-called heroes,” he sneered, swinging his torch up to rest upon his shoulder. “Have you come to admit defeat and join me?”

 

“Not a chance!” Coyote shouted back, clenching his fist tight around the handle of his gun.

 

“A shame,” Crusader sighed, tossing his torch back into his swinging hand and flinging a fireball at them. The duo split apart as it hurtled towards them, dodging to either side of the scorching shot. Another followed in rapid succession and the two hit the deck, but Coyote yelped as the second projectile burnt his new tail. 

 

“We can’t keep this up forever, Dragonfly!” Coyote hissed, and Dragonfly grimaced in agreement. Just before he could give the order to move onto their last resort plan, a disembodied chuckle halted his words in his throat.

 

“You two look to be having some trouble,” the voice was feminine, a Spanish accent gracing the smooth English. 

 

“Who said that?” Dragonfly searched the roof but found no traces of anyone atop it but them. They received another warm laugh in return.

 

“You just have to ask for help,” she chided them from thin air. “Go on, ask.” Distracted, a well-aimed fireball caught Coyote off guard. It singed the sleeve of his coat, igniting fibers, and he yelped in surprise, slapping at the tiny flames with his metal hand. 

 

“Jeez, help us! Please!” Dragonfly brought Coyote closer, eyeing the air suspiciously as he tended to the burn on his arm. 

 

“Good boy,” One of Coyote’s ears was tamped down and he whined in surprise at the invisible touch. 

 

As Dragonfly helped Coyote back to his feet, both of their attentions were caught by a purple glimmer atop Crusader’s armored shoulder. It took a vaguely human shape, that of a young woman, as it slid down his arm, dragging long nails over his gauntlet and leaving it sparking with purple. The glimmer disappeared as quickly as it had appeared, but Crusader was too distracted to care. He shook his purple arm like a ragdoll, as though it had fallen asleep.

 

“What have you done to my shield?” he demanded, eyeing the heroes atop the building. Dragonfly narrowed his eyes, staring at the busted shield generator. 

 

“Coyote, now’s your chance!” he gasped, shoving the overheated dog towards the edge of the roof, where he had better line of sight. “The shield is down!” Dragonfly pulled back the string of his bow as he slid to the ground, landing shots in the Crusader’s armor and helmet as Coyote charged up to take him down. The knight growled and dove after Dragonfly with his weapon, slamming it into the already-destroyed road and rumbling the ground. Scampering along the ground as fast as he could manage while shooting, Dragonfly prayed that he was too small to hit, biding time for his partner. 

 

“Draw!” came Coyote’s voice again, but this time no flash of light as he was blocked. The shot from his six-shooter echoed as loud as the Crusader’s bellow as it cracked into his helm, shattering the iron into a million pieces that crumbled like dust over his white hair and beard. Forced to his knee, the knight was frozen in place as the rest of his armor underwent a similar disassembly, rust soaking into the metal like water into a sponge, cracking into plates, then crumbs that tumbled down to the ground as sand. Dragonfly drew back an arrow and aimed straight at the frozen behemoth before him, letting loose and shouting.

 

“Ryu ga waga teki wo kurau!” Coyote jumped down next to him as the twin dragons hatched from the arrow, blowing a gust of cool air over them as they barreled towards Crusader, swallowing his body like a snake eating its prey whole; when they had finished, an old man remained on his knee. Dragonfly choked at the sheer size of him, even now that he was human. He stood near seven feet tall, he wagered a guess, rippling with muscle - the monster had not been so much of an exaggeration as he had thought. One eye blinked open on the man’s face, the other scarred shut. 

 

As the dragons washed over the absolutely wrecked town, they restored buildings to their full heights, whisked cars upright and drank up the water that flooded the streets. Finally, they dove for the swarming mass of civilians, confused with their leader defeated until the spirits freed their loyalty to him. Chatter picked up volume exponentially as the people wondered what had transpired, and the old man that had once been Crusader echoed their query.

 

“What happened?” he groaned, pressing a hand to his face as if to soothe a headache. “Why am I out here in the middle of the night?”

 

“You were under the mind control of an evil being,” Dragonfly barked professionally, returning his bow to its place on his back. “But you should be fine now.”

 

“Ah,” the man grunted, declining to question further. The dragon offered a hand to help the man up, but he waved it off and stood on his own without too much trouble. He looked down to the ground, an immense hurt in his eyes as he began to walk towards the huge crowd, slowly migrating back into their homes. 

 

“Sir?” Coyote interrupted his pity march, and he turned around. “I gotta say... You still kinda look like you’d make a pretty good knight,” he chuckled, scratching at his own neck. 

 

“Thank you, young man,” he grunted, something like a laugh, and a small smile lit up his furry face. Dragonfly and Coyote watched him walk off together for a moment before their Miraculous gave simultaneous beeps. Coyote scooted closer to his partner as they both turned to walk off in the opposite direction of the crowd. 

 

“We got pretty lucky, huh? Who’dya think that girl was?” Dragonfly huffed a sigh through his nose and crossed his arms as they walked.

 

“I don’t know, but I don’t like her,” he replied sourly. Coyote made a sound of protest, but Dragonfly cut him off before he could make his argument. “We don’t know anything about her, her motivations, powers, anything! How can I trust that?” Coyote fell silent as they rounded the block and ducked into an alley. “We can’t always be  _ lucky _ , you know, and I don’t like taking handouts.”

 

“Guess you’ve got a point there,” the dog sighed and tucked his hands into his pockets. “See you around?” Their Miraculous gave another set of beeps, and Coyote waved goodbye, leaving Dragonfly to detransform in the relative private of the abandoned alley. At least it was too late for his partner to return to his window.

 

Once he was redressed in his plain pajamas, Hanzo hurried to join the crowds in the street as they shuffled back into their homes. He found Genji as he neared the front door to their high rise, catching onto his wrist and dragging him close for an impromptu hug amidst the mob. The battle had taken his mind off of it, but seeing his brother with that dead look in his eyes, face smeared with soot and rubble had shaken him something awful. A reminder that Genji was alive, well, and kicking was well deserved, though he kicked a tad more than Hanzo remembered. 

 

“So, now you care about me?” Genji scoffed, shoving Hanzo a few feet away. “It takes getting crushed in a building and being hypnotized for a supervillain for you to want me?” the younger rolled his eyes and returned to the doors, leaving Hanzo stock-still on the threshold. He blinked in surprise, but let his brother go, tucking his hands together and looking down to the ground, rocking on his toes and hoping that no one had noticed Genji’s outburst. He was just tired, surely, effects of the hypnosis wearing off - his cheery brother would be back by morning, and for now, he would leave him be. 

 

\--

 

Tucked into his desk at school for only the second time the next morning, Hanzo could barely keep his eyes open. Brawling the Crusader deep into the night and thoughts of Genji had kept him awake for far longer than what he normally considered healthy, but missing what was functionally still his first day of school was not an option. Realizing that the attacks from monsters were not going to let up anytime soon, the district had opted to open the schools back up despite the danger - Coyote and Dragonfly would fight to keep the students safe, their email stated. A rush of pride had filled Hanzo’s chest when he read it, but also a sinking feeling of dread; it was an awful lot of responsibility for two boys.

 

As Hanzo opened his mouth wide for a yawn when no one was looking his way, the classroom door opened. In walked none other than Jesse McCree, the delinquent he’d seen enough of for a lifetime within a half-week. Maybe he had the wrong room, he was just checking with the teacher - Hanzo begged, but no such luck. He scowled as the cowboy noticed him, flashing a smile full of slightly yellow teeth and a quick wave as he moved closer. Hanzo remembered the empty seat to his right and swallowed hard - his bad luck truly knew no ends. 

 

“Howdy,” Jesse’s wide smile was still plastered to his cheeks as he tossed his bag to the ground unceremoniously and threw himself into Hanzo’s neighboring seat. He didn’t grace him with a response, and the smile fell slightly, but he seemed undeterred. “You know, I think we got off on the wrong foot.”

 

“What makes you say that?” Hanzo huffed, laying his cheek into his palm and glancing to the boy with his best disinterested look. He didn’t disagree, but he also couldn’t think of any right foot for them to have got off on - Jesse was nosy and loud, exactly his brother’s type. Good looking, sure, but the casual flirting was too much for Hanzo to put up with, rather like a certain dog he knew. 

 

“I know I’ve been kinda,  _ forward _ with you,” Jesse continued, ignoring the sarcastic quip. “An’ I guess I probably made you pretty uncomfortable, right?” At least he could recognize his own errors, Hanzo thought. 

 

“I jus’ wanna apologize. Never meant to upset you,” the cowboy continued, and Hanzo couldn’t help but give a small smile when he searched for a reaction. Perhaps Jesse was more of a respectable young man than he had previously assumed. “And I was hopin’ that we could be friends?” He offered a hand up and Hanzo laid his delicately atop, where it was treated to a firm squeeze and shake. A sharp breath was forced into his lungs as the sheer warmth of Jesse’s hand enveloped his own, and before he could do a thing about it, the boy’s other arm stretched around his shoulders and pulled him into a tight hug. Hanzo’s eyes fluttered as he felt Jesse’s arm flex around his own, and he let out a tiny gasp of disappointment when his new ‘friend’ pulled away with a satisfied grin.

 

_ Oh, no.  _


	4. Ice-olater

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A nice day at the pool is ruined by bad weather! Whatever shall our heroes do?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aaaaaaw guys im so sorry this took so long... there's been a lot of stress at home and school for me lately, and i just. didn't have the motivation to work on this. so sorry. i'll try not to take this long again, but updates likely will be pretty irregular until mid-june. 
> 
> anyway! with the end of this chapter we're gonna start to get into the first major event in the story, i'm so excited!! hope you all continue to enjoy, i appreciate your support so much <3
> 
> my beta and i decided all of the akuma names at the beginning, before finalizing their abilities and stories... "ice-olater" was really punny with my original idea but... it's a little different now! whoops!

A gust of stale air, just over room temperature, blew over Hanzo’s sticky cheeks, caught on his sweat, and he grimaced. His own hand churning the air around his face and collar was hardly helping to relieve the clammy feeling he got every few seconds as the air conditioner in the gym, on its last breaths, attempted to cool the class. It gave a haughty shudder and the air stopped momentarily - the class watched with bated breaths as they counted the seconds. A pregnant, silent three pass before it picks up once again, the air smelling distinctly of leaking lubricant and decade-old dust. 

 

Hanzo wiped the back of his sleeve down his neck, sighing as he was hit with another puff. The weather in his new home, while agreeable on most days, was strikingly similar to that of the burning pits of hell, as far as he knew. Sometimes it felt like the halls were lined with furnaces, like these people are never warm enough - he often missed the mildness of Hanamura, the sweet breezes that cooled rather than stuck. He groaned in protest as one such furnace plopped itself down next to him on the unforgiving lacquer of the wooden floor. 

 

“Hanzo, if you’re so hot,” the first half of the sentence earned a sputter from its audience. “Why don’tcha take off yer damn coat?” Jesse finished, grinning smugly as Hanzo’s cheeks retained their pink color. He hugged his sweatshirt sleeves to his body protectively, tugging the edges down over his knuckles and refusing to grace the cowboy with an answer. Jesse only laughed in response, clapping Hanzo’s shoulder with a playful roughness that reminded him distinctly of his brother. Or, at least a past version of Genji that enjoyed his presence. He grunted under his breath, chasing the thought away. 

 

He’s snapped from his reverie and the distaste at Jesse’s warm hand lingering on his already overheated skin as the imposing figure of the gym teacher strode out of his glaring fluorescent shadow. It felt rather like stage lighting, Hanzo thought. They were less of an audience to his barking, as he was the one masked out by the blinding overheads. It was difficult to understand his words as the A/C continued to groan and moan above their heads, but Hanzo caught onto the instructions eventually - they involved the old, dying unit, ironically enough. 

 

“Now, I’m sure all’a ya ’ve noticed the old thing’s givin’ out on us. Luckily, the school board has finally, finally decided to replace ‘er,” the teacher wiped a drop of sweat from his brow like a tear of joy. “Nothin’ comes for free, though, kids. It’s gonna be a real scorcher next class, and we won’t have no A/C to get us through it.” 

 

The teacher surveyed the sudden drop of smiles, drank in the chorus of unhappy groans. 

 

“I thought it’d be a good lesson. Fortunately for you, though,” his own sadistic chuckle fell, and he brushed his slimy gray hair from his forehead. “The school board has elected to move yer classes to the local pool ‘til such a time as the cooling system is fixed.”

 

There was a moment of silence again, as the students considered this new information. Hanzo heard the first whoop of delight from strikingly close to his right ear as Jesse gave a holler. Soon, the rest of the class had joined in, sullen expressions and pursed lips replaced by cries of excitement and face-splitting smiles. Hanzo observed the festivities around him with a neutral face, then glanced over at Jesse. His loud celebrating had petered out, and he was left cooing softly with the cadence of the crowd, tugging at his t-shirt collar to cool himself. 

 

Hanzo had never enjoyed swimming as a child - it was always simply a way to cool off, never the social activity his classmates saw. However, with each little pull at Jesse’s shirt, each peek of his caramel complexion beneath, he could feel his breathe shortening and his excitement growing. Tearing his eyes away, he gulped down a breath of air to regain his composure. When he looked back, for just a moment, Jesse was grinning like a madman. 

 

\--

 

When Hanzo returned home that night, the apartment was silent.

 

He called out for Genji, not expecting a reply, as had been their routine for the past few days. They would surface for their evening meal each night, sitting together in front of the television for a few minutes in a false camaraderie as the younger scarfed silently, then meandered back to the comfort of his room. It was, Hanzo supposed, better than both of them taking their dinners in their own rooms. He chalked the uncomfortable silent treatment up to homesickness, on both of their parts. He appreciated the facade Genji would play for him, despite his obviously growing distaste in their new house. They would be home, truly home, soon enough, and everything would be fixed.

 

Tonight, however, Hanzo dreaded sitting silently on the sofa with his brother barely half a foot away, out of reach. 

 

“Genji!” He shouted again, dropping his bag from his burning shoulder onto the rug. No response. With a resolved sigh, he stomped down the small hallway leading to their bedrooms - it was his cowbell, he supposed. He didn’t mean to startle as his knuckles rapped on the younger’s door, calling for him again. A rustle came from inside, and a thump as Genji dropped to the floor from his plush bed.

 

“What?” Genji dragged out the vowel as he spoke in English, much to Hanzo’s surprise. He gave a yawn, rolling his shoulder against his neck until there was an audible pop. 

 

“Have you really only been sleeping?” Hanzo chuckled. “I thought you were ignoring me on purpose.” Genji shot him an ambiguous grimace. 

 

“Maybe I was,” he mumbled, glaring at his toes. “What do you want?” Down to its simplest form, his goal had been to break the silence between them. In hindsight, it seemed a poor reason to rouse his napping sibling - something else would have to do.

 

“I...” he began, meeting Genji’s narrowed eyes anxiously. “I need to borrow something to swim in,” he tucked his hands behind the small of his back, straightening his shoulders and puffing his chest to bolster the lie that was his confidence in that answer. Genji raised an eyebrow suspiciously, then retreated back into his room without warning. Hanzo very nearly called after him again, hand raising to rest on the faux golden knob as Genji’s leafy top disappeared into the shuttered darkness of his lair. Only a moment later, the great abyss bared its teeth again, Genji popping half of his torso and an arm out as he clung to the door. He tossed a pair of trunks in the general direction of Hanzo’s fingers.

 

“That all?” He huffed, tapping his nails impatiently on the white wood. Hanzo glanced down, inspecting the slick weave of black shorts, accompanied by a metallic golden cord and accents. He looked back up, searching Genji’s face. His brows were drawn together, eyes hooded and bagged as though he were sleeping poorly, even with all of his naps - so much more than a little homesickness, but what else? 

 

“No,” Hanzo dropped his hands to his sides and shook his head, loose hair falling like a curtain into his eyes. He tucked it behind his ear. Something, anything - he needed to stall his brother’s escape, even someone as socially dense as he could see that. The twinge of interest, cautious excitement in the corners of Genji’s eyes told him so. 

 

“What else, then?” The words had that same catty quality Genji often spoke with back in Hanamura, when he meant to tease, but it was a relief to hear. It was something more than the deadpan silence they’d been stewing in all week. 

 

“I need your advice,” Hanzo sighed, knuckles curling in on themselves. He didn’t exactly want to relinquish the secret on the tip of his tongue, but what other choice did he have, to keep his brother interested? “With a... Relationship?” The word felt wrong, uncomfortable as it left his lips. “Crush.” He corrected himself gruffly, under his own breath. Genji’s eyes lit up and the bags disappeared.

 

“Really?” He licked over his teeth, opening the door enough to reveal the rest of his body, clothed in pajamas despite the early hour. “Little ‘ol me?”

 

“Don’t make me beg, brother,” Hanzo murmured, pressing the back of one of his cool hands to his own burning cheek, averting his eyes. “Who else would I ask?” The cat bared his sharp little teeth and the door swung open to its limit, ushering Hanzo to follow his brother inside. It shut behind them and suddenly there were a pair of hands on Hanzo’s shoulders, shoving him forwards as he lost his balance and tumbled into Genji’s comforter, draped halfway atop his bed and pooling on the carpet. Genji followed, collapsing into the quilt and grasping Hanzo’s nearby arm like a pillow. 

 

“Tell me, tell me!” 

 

“Alright! No names, but...” 

 

\--

 

Sun beat down on Mei’s bare cheeks like a hot iron, sweat ran in tiny rivulets down her neck, tucked into the fluffy collar of her jacket. Her eyes searched the faces looming before her frantically, teeth digging rather deeply into her bottom lip.

 

“It’s way too hot for that thing out here,” one boy crowed, tongue peeking out from between his yellowed grin. She shook her head wildly.

 

“I-I’m fine, thank you,” she tried to laugh off their stares, but her breath caught in her throat as they began to jostle closer. The tallest made a grab at her sleeve, tugging.

 

“C’mon, baby. Take the coat off,” he ran his open palm up to her shoulder, nearing her buttons. Panicking, she shoved his arm off and turned on her heel, only to find her nose pressed to the cheap wood of the changing rooms. A hand grabbed her by her hood and flipped her back towards the pack of men; she raised her hands up in defense. 

 

“Get away!” she cried, sniffling through the steaming tears beginning to drip down her cheeks. They all snickered, and the tall one thrust his hand to the seam of her coat, snapping a button open. Mei shrieked and slapped his arm away, using all of her strength to break through their ranks on a mad dash towards the more populated side of the pool yard. A chorus of groans and jeers erupted from behind her as she ran and ran.

 

“Fat bitch!” One screamed through his cupped hands, “It was a joke, stupid!” She pulled her hood up around her ears as they shouted and the other pool patrons began to notice her slowing to a panting stop. Mei fell to her knees at the far edge, back pressed to the scalding chain link fence as she steamed alive inside her own jacket.

 

“ There, there, ” a gentle whisper caressed her fevered red ear, low and rumbly like an old grandfather - one with a smoking problem. “ This is such a drab season, isn’t it? Too hot, so unfair, ” the voice continued, and Mei nodded meekly in agreement. 

 

“But there’s nothing I can do about it,” she mumbled into the fur trim; it tickled her pink nose. 

 

“ Think again. ”

 

\--

 

McCree gave a loud, long whistle to call attention as he spied Hanzo across the pool yard. The boy jumped in surprise, whipping around to glare at the offender. His expression softened some when he saw the cowboy moseying up to stand closer, rubber sandals making a poor substitute for his regular boots and spurs. The transfer student gave a tentative wave from his speck of shade, motioning Jesse over. Eagerly, he complied, dropping himself up against the tool shed, shoulder to shoulder with Hanzo. 

 

They stood in silence for a few minutes, observing the scramble and shuffle of high school students clamoring to enjoy the sun and cool water. McCree was content, stealing little looks at Hanzo’s sharp profile and the tight expanse of his bare chest, torso tucked into a pair of dark, loose hanging shorts. The deep, complex tattoo that swallowed his left side was a lovely contrast to the sun reflecting from the rest of his pale skin - out in the open, he was free to observe the spiraling beast squirming its way up the boy’s well-muscled arm. 

 

“Don’t think I’ve ever seen a sleeve that big on a guy so young,” Jesse whistled again, low in his throat as his eyes walked their way up the serpent’s back. Hanzo grunted in surprise as he met his friend’s gaze, attempting to hide the offending arm behind his back. “No, hey, it’s real nice!” Jesse prodded at the muscle on his arm, urging him to present it in full. With a nip to his lower lip, Hanzo tentatively raised the arm back up, offering his tattoo to Jesse, who eagerly latched onto his skin for a closer look. “Yeah. Beautiful,” he nodded in consensus with his own words, thumbing at Hanzo’s vibrantly blue flesh. 

 

“Thanks,” Hanzo murmured, fingers trembling almost imperceptibly as McCree prodded and squeezed his skin. Jesse hummed absentmindedly in response. 

 

“You know,” he said after a few moments of running his palms down the intricate dragon. “Kinda looks like the one that superhero fella’s got. Dragonfly.”

 

It took less than a second for the name to sink in, and Hanzo tore his arm back in horror.

 

“Hey, hey! Sorry?” Jesse reached back to press his still overly warm hands to Hanzo to calm him down, but he dodged the affection. 

 

“The dragon tattoo is a sacred family tradition, passed down for centuries,” his voice shook as he searched around for his thin sweatshirt, scoffing. “It is entirely unique, and to insinuate it bears any relation to any gimmicky _ hero- _ .”

 

“Aw, Hanzo, I didn’t mean it,” Jesse whined, shoving his hands into his trunk pockets. “It’s real nice, shoulda known it meant somethin’ special. Sorry,” he grumbled as a sleeve covered up the ink for good. 

 

“I am not unreasonable,” Hanzo conceded after a thorough observation of Jesse’s moping. “You are forgiven.”

 

“Gonna take the shirt back off?” Jesse looked up from his slouch expectantly. Hanzo shook his head.

 

“It’s growing rather cold out here, anyway,” he shrugged, and Jesse realized the truth in his words as a strong gust hit his face. 

 

“Aw, geez, it is!” the cowboy shivered, and Hanzo reached down between their feet to toss him a thick towel. “Middle’a spring in New Mexico, what the hell is this?” The pool yard seemed distinctly more overcast than it was the moment before, and as Jesse searched the sky for a source, a loud crack rang through his ears. 

 

Every pair of eyes on the inside of the chain link fence snapped to the massive pool in the middle of the enclosure. A wave of frosty white began to work its way across the surface, spidery patterns forming as it sped up. The gentle ebb and splash of the chlorinated water stood still, and screams began to fill the air as the deep-freeze caught up with meandering patrons in the water. Shouts and cries were cut off abruptly, though, as the ice did not slow down even a millisecond for them. 

 

Jesse recoiled in horror as the glassy ice clawed its way over the people in the pool, wrapping them like a cold tomb, faces contorted in horror beyond a fossilizing mirror. A gentle powder of snow began to fall, out of place against the striking spikes and blocks of solid ice worming their ways through any liquid water they could touch. 

 

“Hanzo, let’s get...” Jesse glanced to his side, ready to make a tactical escape with as many civilians as he could carry (one), but the space once filled with his heat was barren and cold. “Hanzo?” He called through the din of panic, looking around. He was nowhere to be found among the runners, screamers, fence-jumpers, which was all the more terrifying. 

 

“Jesse,  _ look _ !” A sharp, tiny whisper snapped him out of his rabbit hole, and he looked down to his shorts pocket to find Wenndi, pointing up to a dark figure atop the changing room roof. 

 

“The villain...?” Jesse squinted, shielding his eyes from the snow as it steadily picked up pace; each little flake on his face burned like a paper cut. The silhouette didn’t have the sinister aura of an enemy, though, and Jesse felt his face split as he saw a swish of a blue scaled tail below the dark figure. Following the lead of most of his more sensible peers, Jesse jumped the fence in one bound, fishing Wenndi from his pocket as he ducked behind a maintenance shed to transform.

 

\--

 

Ice flakes whipped themselves into a frenzy, licking Dragonfly’s skin as he surveyed the panic in the yard from atop a downy roof. The villain was nowhere to be found, no source to the chaos to focus on. 

 

A deep thunk sound atop the shed-like structure he crouched upon drew his attention, and looking back he spied a leather-gloved hand buried in the snow as a figure pulled themselves up to the roof to join him. Coyote swung his legs up over the edge, dropping to a similar crouch in the powder.

 

“You got here fast,” Dragonfly’s lips curled up as he saw the flushed skin on his partner’s cheeks, the puff of white steam from his lips as he chuckled.

 

“So did you,” Coyote countered. “I was in the area.” Dragonfly grunted in reluctant acceptance. “Any idea what’s goin’ on?” the vigilante drawled curiously, studying the sharp contrast of Dragonfly’s vibrantly blue mask to the dreary flurry swallowing the sky.

 

“Not a clue,” the serpent admitted, catching Coyote’s gaze with a suspicious purse of his lips and tucking a loose lock of his bangs behind one subtly pointed ear. 

 

“Look, look! Dragonfly!” A sudden shout from below their perch interrupted their conversation; Dragonfly turned abruptly to face an accusing finger directed at his body. Flustered and confused, he looked to Coyote for help as more and more civilians below began to pause in their desperate escape attempts from the falling snow - he was still unsure how so many had learned their names without a formal introduction.

 

“We’re saved!” Came a squealed cry from the forming crowd, and Coyote snickered as Dragonfly bristled at the comment.

 

“Well, don’t be shy, now,” his partner urged, gesturing Dragonfly to address the people below, shivering in the blustering wind. “Go on an’ tell ‘em yer gonna keep ‘em safe.” His smile was warm and encouraging as Dragonfly paled, shaking his head and crawling out of their sight on the roof.

 

“You do it!” the dragon whispered harshly, peeking down to check if he was still being stared at.

 

“C’mon, doll. They trust you!” Coyote brushed his shoulder comfortingly. “You’re their hero.”

 

“And you aren’t?” Dragonfly chewed his lip bitterly. He shrunk into his shoulders as his question was met with a burst of jovial laughter from his partner. 

 

“Nah, darlin’. You get right down there and tell ‘em what’s what, got it?” He shot Dragonfly a wink. With a soft moan of discomfort, Dragonfly slid from the roof and landed on the powder below, surrounded by students and sparse adults, waiting with bated breaths for his explanation. The chatter rose as he fell to stand gracefully, much like the sudden, simultaneous gasp of a crowd as a performer takes the stage or the first firework makes a spectacle. His partner landed next, sidling up to press shoulders for a bit of reassurance as Dragonfly struggled to find the correct words.

 

“There doesn’t seem to be a source to... all of this, yet,” Dragonfly gestured awkwardly with his hands to the falling snow, feeling quite acutely every pair of eyes on the complex directed towards him. “For now, we - Coyote and I, that is...” he stumbled over his explanation, like every speech he had ever given in his life had disappeared, the perfectly groomed leader and calm public figure that he had been raised to be had melted away with his civilian clothes. “We would advise you to stay inside while we search for a solution,” he pointed towards the changing rooms and various maintenance sheds around the complex desperately. Coyote clapped both hands over his shoulders and nodded solemnly.

 

“Wouldn’t want all’ya to get a cold, now would we?” Dragonfly could feel the tension drain from his body, leaving him limp as Coyote took over the speech with a charming grin and flash of his sharp teeth. “Jus’ let us take care of this. We’ll get everything fixed up in no time.”

 

Like under magical influence, the crowd began to dissipate, feeding into the unlocked doors of the shelters. When they were alone in the snowy yard, Coyote released his partner’s shoulders as he turned around to face him. 

 

“Thank you,” he murmured, appalled at his own ineptitude. 

 

“Ain’t no trouble, pardner,” Coyote nodded with a tip of his stetson. Dragonfly shuddered. “You cold?” 

 

“I suppose I am not equipped for cold-weather hero work,” the serpent chuckled dryly, but refused the offer of Coyote’s leather coat when he began to slip it off. He covered his exposed shoulders with his hands.  “I am simply cold blooded. I’ll be fine, thank you.” Coyote nodded with a snort and slipped the coat back on. 

 

“How sweet,” a soft voice murmured from some ambiguous location, confused by the furious wind. Dragonfly looked back towards the doors to the shelter, expecting to find a lingering girl, with no such luck. “Are you done?” The voice turned sinister and sharp, solidifying as both heroes turned to look through a gap in the ice: a pristinely white figure in a thick parka, as bright as direct sunlight. She sat upon one of the popsicle-patrons enclosed in the frozen-solid pool, still gruesome to look at and appearing bluer by the minute. Only her face peeked from the fur-lined hood, drawn up with a delicate pair of lips pouted below dark eyes behind square glasses, framed with cake-batter brown hair. Her silhouette was marred by the addition of two wickedly curved, razor sharp horns, the same boney color as the rest of her ensemble. Those two pink lips peeked open as she adjusted her glasses under the heroes’ gaze, and she licked her chops - the two winced at the sight. A snakelike tongue, black as licorice and quick as a whip lolled out from between her monstrously sharp bear teeth. 

 

“You should really dress more appropriately, if you’re cold,” the girl scolded, snapping her fingers - the heroes stood still, too surprised to move, and the gentle drizzle of snow around their shoulders was whipped into a frenzy. It blew on an icy wind, swirling through the air like a tornado. Dragonfly glanced to Coyote, only to find the few inches of space between them full of snow, an impenetrable vortex. Crystals bit at his uncovered flesh, stinging as he attempted to suck in a breath of air. There wasn’t hardly a lungful, and the serpent choked, falling to his knees. His cheeks and shoulders felt clammy, cold, snowflakes no longer melting as they collided with his skin. 

 

A rough tug at his hair pulled him into a full on panic - the girl was somewhere behind him, within easy reach of his Miraculous, and he couldn’t muster the strength to wipe the sleet from his eyes. Desperately, he rolled over onto his back and delivered a weak kick to her gloved fingers as she reached into the vortex again, clutching at nothing. For a split second, the snow slowed and a gap formed in his cage: through it, he saw her demonic scowl. Taking a breath while he had the chance, Dragonfly reached behind him and drew the curved blade from his back, fingers trembling as they squeezed the slick handle. He didn’t have the strength to wield his sword against her, not with his struggling lungs and frostbitten fingers, but at the very least he could fend off her grasps for his ribbon. Through the walls of the ice dimension, he heard a bang, then another half a second later. A spurt of tar-like black fluid hit his nose in tiny droplets and the snow around him fell deadly still, dropping to the ground like gravity intended. 

 

Behind the icy villain stood Coyote in a similarly frosty state, revolver still raised as he panted, staring at the oozing black holes in her plush coat. Dragonfly scrambled to his feet, leaning on his sword planted in the ice like a walking cane as his body screamed for rest. Slowly, the girl looked down to her stomach. Her gaze was lazy, without distress as she quietly observed the hole, then looked right back up to Dragonfly with a sneer. 

 

“I’ll just freeze the leftovers,” she curled her lips around her teeth in a wicked grin, raising a hand towards the dragon. He jolted, tugging at his sword in the icy ground. Wisps of blue and white swam around the air between her fingers, dancing between them like a cheap magic trick. Dragonfly squeezed his eyes shut in panic as he heard an icy crack, tensing his body as he prepared for the imminent deep-freeze, but it never came. Instead, a force knocked into his stomach, breaking his sword loose and sending him sliding across the ground like a fish through water. His eyes popped open as the breath was knocked out of him, just in time to see a shock of ice encase his partner, still propped up on the ground from pushing him out of the attack. 

 

“Coyote..!” Dragonfly gasped, covering his mouth in horror with one gloved hand. The witch cackled in disbelief, looking over her own handiwork. Silently, Dragonfly deeply regretted everything he had said and thought about accepting help from strangers - if the purple woman showed up to save his skin again, he would grovel at her toes. This was just too much for two children to handle. He hoped for a few seconds, but knew that it was pointless as the villain took her time edging closer to his position on the ground. He heard her tongue click and swallowed a lump of bile in his throat as he avoided her gaze, staring at the block of ice with his partner encased. Frost twirled around her fingers when he looked back to them, and her pretty pink lips pursed smugly. 

 

“Look how easily the _ heroes _ have fallen,” she sighed dramatically. “Some saviors you are. What would all your little fans say to this?” The reminder of the innocent civilians huddled in the cold, waiting for him to rescue them from the witch, made his stomach drop. What right did he have to give up, the only line of defense between the string of magical puppets and the lives of the city’s people? Frantically, he searched the yard for an escape, for anything as the girl stalked closer at a painfully slow rate.

 

Across the entire ice fortress, a winding expanse of silver pipes and meters that monitored the water for the hot tub trembled with pressure, daggerlike icicles wobbling like liquid water. The villain stood between him and escape, but what choice did he have? Slowly, he drew his bow, leaving his sword sheathed in the ground. She hummed with interest as he drew the string back, fingers shaking like the string they pinched. He released, and in an instant a massive wall of ice formed in front of her body, shielding her body from the arrow. 

 

Just as suddenly, Dragonfly snatched his sword and dashed forwards, scaling the wall with a mighty leap and kicking off it to land on the other side of both it and her. She pivoted on a heel, dropping the wall with a wave of her hand and standing ready to counter any follow-up attacks. None came.

 

Dragonfly scampered over to the pipes, clambering on top of them. His metal boots slipped in the slick frost, but he stood tall. 

 

“Such a dramatic escape. I’m impressed,” she nodded condescendingly, “But you forgot the most crucial part: escaping.” She meandered closer with hands behind her back, much like an innocent child. He scowled. 

 

“It was no escape, demon,” he hissed, and she quirked an eyebrow, drawing her face close to the pipes as though she had no fear of him in the slightest. A mistake.

 

Dragonfly’s sword came down in a flash, narrowly missing the girl’s face, but hitting its target nonetheless: the enchanted blade cut through the frozen pipes like softened butter, releasing a cloud of burning steam. She shrieked, batting the broiling vapor away with her gloves as it fogged her glasses and roasted her skin, leaving it bright pink as she gasped for breath. Concentration broken, even the snow on the ground around them began to melt and the fall stopped entirely. A telltale crack raced upon Coyote’s prison and Dragonfly rushed to his aid, chipping at the corners with his weapon as the witch continued to struggle with the flowing steam. By the time she had ducked out of the cloud of steam, Coyote’s limp, freezing body was freed and Dragonfly was scampering for the fence. With mussed hair and a thick sheen of sweat on lobster-red skin, the witch screamed at his back.

 

“You’ll be back! You’ll have to come back for all of these hostages!” She grinned with her evil teeth, gesturing towards the townspeople the heroes had attempted to usher to safety. Dragonfly bit his tongue as he leaped over the chain-links with his partner clutched close to his chest, neglecting to respond. He would be back, certainly - he only needed a quick break to lick his wounds - and maybe get Coyote a hot drink.

\--

 

As gently as he could, Dragonfly set Coyote’s body up against the back of the poolhouse, out of sight. He was breathing, faintly, but his skin was a sickly shade of blue and an awful cold. Dragonfly reached behind himself and beneath his weapons to loosen the cloth around his midsection, untying the bow and straightening the silken fabric out before wrapping it loosely around his partner’s neck and mouth. 

 

“Coyote?” He whispered, pressing the flat of his palms into the man’s cheeks. His eyelids trembled, he stirred slightly. “Wake up, Coyote.” Dragonfly drug his hands downwards, down Coyote’s sides, and felt a small lump in one of his pockets. Curious, he reached inside and produced a golden lighter - its weight indicated it still held fluid, and Dragonfly breathed a sigh of relief. He brushed a place in the yellow grass free of snow gathered his obi from Coyote’s neck, instead bundling it on the ground. With a flick of the igniter, the lighter came to life, the soft amber of the flame a welcome break from the dreary snow. He held the flame to the bundle of fabric and it crackled into a bonfire within seconds, though Dragonfly couldn’t help but notice the lack of charring and burning of the fabric. 

 

Disregarding the likely-magical properties of his clothing, Dragonfly reached over Coyote’s limp legs to grab both of his freezing hands, rubbing them in his own and tugging them closer to the fire. He stirred again, fingers twitching, and Dragonfly brought him a little closer. Suddenly, he awoke with a start, recoiling his hands and hugging them to his chest.

 

“Jesus! That burns!” Coyote hissed, shaking his singed fingers out in the chilly air. 

 

“Sorry!” Dragonfly winced, folding his hands over in his lap.

 

“It’s okay,” Coyote sighed, leaning forward to feel the glow of the heat lick up his skin. They sat in companionable silence for a few moments, enjoying the warmth.

 

“You didn’t have to do that, you know,” Dragonfly whispered after a minute. “Save me.”

 

“‘Course I did,” Coyote replied without second though, cracking his knuckles and humming pleasantly as the fire warmed his achy joints. “Knew you could handle it.”

 

“I almost didn’t!” Dragonfly warned, exasperated, and Coyote shrugged.

 

“But’cha did. You’ll get better. I believe in ya.”

 

“Won’t our enemies also grow more powerful?” They both bristled at the thought, memory of destruction caused by their two most recent foes a fresh abrasion on their minds. 

 

“They might,” Coyote murmured into his cupped hands, blowing warm breath over his dark skin. “Leave it at that.” Dragonfly nodded solemnly. “For now, we gotta focus on Elsa back there. Any other brilliant plans?” The serpent chuckled at the outdated allusion and nodded.

 

“She seems to need to concentrate on her ice to keep it going. If we distract her, preferably with something hot, she is defenseless.”

 

“So, just shootin’ her is out?” 

 

“Unfortunately... Though, earlier, your shots did keep her busy for a few moments.”

 

“Last resort?” Coyote grinned, plucking his revolver from its holster and giving it a flashy spin.

 

“Last resort,” the dragon conceded. They seemed to have an awful lot of those. “As for the heat...” he picked Coyote’s gilded lighter out from where he had tucked it safely into the folds of his sleeve, as well as his bow from where it had been hastily secured on his back. “Do you smoke, Coyote?” His partner’s face solidified and he pursed his lips, shaking his head.

 

“Naw, not anymore. That was my, uh... Dad’s,” he muttered, reaching his hand out for the lighter. Dragonfly nodded in understanding and placed it gently in his gloved hand. 

 

“A good thing you carry it with you,” he offered a small smile, latching onto Coyote’s glove for a firm squeeze before he could recoil. “You might have ended up a pup-sicle without it,” Dragonfly covered his mouth with his other hand, snorting softly at his own joke.

 

“Aw, darlin’,” Coyote huffed a proud sigh, “That was god-awful.” He returned the lighter to his jacket pocket and bared his teeth in a satisfied grin at the dragon, watching the little crinkle in the corner of his eyes behind his mask as he giggled. Recovering a few moments later, Dragonfly picked his bow up from the packed-snow beneath them and drew the string back slightly until an arrow popped into being. He held the metal tip to their fire and it lit as quickly as the fabric, glowing brilliantly. Coyote gave a whistle. 

 

“I’ll only have one shot,” Dragonfly chewed his bottom lip as Coyote tossed a handful of snow atop the fire; it extinguished with a sizzle. He collected the fabric from the puddle and brushed it clean. 

 

“You’ll make it,” Coyote rocked to his feet and motioned for Dragonfly to do the same. His tone made it clear it was not a subject to be discussed at length. 

 

“If I don’t?” the archer deadpanned, ignoring the warning. 

 

“We’ll find another way,” the gunslinger squeezed Dragonfly’s hand as he pulled him to his feet, swinging the long strip of cloth over his shoulders and dropping it to his waist, fastening it in his best attempt at the knot of the original costume. Dragonfly’s grip on his bow tightened as his partner’s hands brushed over his hips, avoiding his eyes. “You’ll make it,” Coyote repeated, and Dragonfly nodded, swallowing hard. He raised his bow and single arrow between their bodies, holding a hand to shield the delicate flame. It reflected on the icy ground, casting orange shadows and highlights on his palm and the gentle drifts. 

 

“Ready?” Dragonfly let out a deep breath. It was unspoken, but they both knew there would be no third chances. The ice witch would not make the same mistake twice, and if one of them were to fall victim to her power again... Dragonfly shuddered at the thought.

 

“Cold?” Coyote gave a soft smile, and Dragonfly laughed softly, one quick half-breath. He loosened his arrow from the bow and hooked the weapon itself over his shoulder, placing the shaft of the burning arrow between his teeth and leaping up to climb the pool shelter. Offering a hand down the roof, he felt Coyote’s metal fingers lace with his own and prop himself up without much help. Carefully, practiced, Dragonfly placed the ever-important arrow back in its bow cradle. 

 

“Distraction duty?” Coyote whispered, awaiting instructions. Dragonfly nodded his approval and the gunslinger slid his way down into the pool gate, revolver drawn. The crunch of the powder below his boots echoed in the empty complex. A hiss from some ambiguous location, hidden in the light flurry, makes the hairs on the back of Dragonfly’s neck stand on end.

 

“Hush,” it whispered. “You boys are ever so loud.”

 

The snow picked up and all Dragonfly could see was the first time they had approached her. Suffocating in the cloying ice, choking on the air. A tiny flash of mottled black, a stain across the front of a chest from somewhere below his perch, roaming around Coyote -  the only clues he had to the girl’s presence. Purely on instinct, he gritted his teeth and pulled back the string of his bow. He heard a crunch and a grunt as Coyote was forced to the ground, and the black stain reappeared.

 

Flames licked his fingers but no burn ever came. All he could feel was the heat on his cheek, the ice surrounding him had vanished as he released the arrow. With the force of his draw, it went flying at the speed of a bullet. With a heavy thunk, the metal tip embedded itself in something heavy and hot, and its fluffy outer skin went up in flames. 

 

A piercing scream rang through the heroes’ ears. The clouds above disappeared as though they had been sucked up by a god through a straw, the snow ceased at once and the drifts along the ground began to dissipate; the white-clad girl was revealed, slick and sticky with sinister black fluid. She grasped desperately at the shaft of the arrow embedded deep between her lungs, rolling on the ground as fire suckled at her skin and ate up her clothing and hair. 

 

Coyote was on his back less than a foot away from her struggle, and as he moved to escape, she grabbed him by the ankle with her burning glove. Dragonfly launched himself off the now-cleared roof the moment she touched him; the flames had not half a second to spread. With a battle cry he threw his body atop hers, crushing the arrow deeper into her flesh and forcing out a pained choke. Still, the flames dared not burn him as he used his momentum to slide their struggle across the cement. They collided with water, hot water, as they slipped over the edge of the recently-defrosted hot tub, unconscious civilians floating limply atop the surface. The bubbling, boiling heat overcame the flames but left the villain immobilized, struggling for breath through the water dipping into her lungs with each push Dragonfly gave against her body. Wet hair and fabric entangled them like jungle vines, tying limbs motionless and obscuring vision, but the hero had no need for such things. With a flip of his soaked braid over his shoulder he snatched his sword from his back sheath, raising it high above their struggle into the warming air. 

 

“Ryuu ga waga teki wo kurau!” In a spectacular burst of light and heat, the two dragons fought their way from the blade of the katana. They swirled in the water, swallowing the girl whole, brushing over the motionless victims before rising high into the air and puncturing the sky itself. 

 

With that, the adrenaline rush fell flat. Dragonfly felt his eyes grow heavy and he collapsed against the rim of the pool, vision fuzzy. His dragons went about their work as he blinked heavily; a large pair of hands hooked themselves beneath his arms. The crispness of the air had dissipated and the baking sun was back in the sky, but the soaked fabric draped over every inch of his body kept him pleasantly cool in his haze - vaguely, he recognized the sound of another body being tossed up next to his. 

 

“Dragonfly? You alright, sugar?” a drawl asked him, and a gloved hand came to rest upon his forehead. He nodded, foggily. “You better get outta here. Only got a few minutes left on your transformation,” the voice continued. Right, right. He forgot about that. Pushing himself to sit up, he noticed the small crowd forming around the pile of unconscious bodies and himself, but this time he couldn’t bring himself to fluster at the attention. 

 

“Until next time,” he mumbled, waving his fingers in Coyote’s general direction before tossing himself over the fence.

 

\--

 

A few minutes, a transformation, and a few more minutes of rest later, Hanzo trailed behind the rest of the gym class as they returned to the school. His sweatshirt hung loosely over his shoulders, sagging as he dragged himself with each step. Water dripped down his back from his soaked hair, yanked back into a messy ponytail and his forehead burned with the sun overhead. 

 

“Hanzo!” A loud call of his name brought his attention, not that he could be bothered to look over his shoulder. He gave a yawn and let himself be pulled to a stop by a strong hand grabbing his upper arm. Beside him, Jesse pants.

 

“How are your grades in this class?” Hanzo asks nonchalantly, reaching over his head to stretch. “Not very good, I’d assume - you only ran a block.”

 

“Aw, darlin’, y’hurt me!” Jesse gave a fake sniffle and clapped his hand to his supposedly broken heart; Hanzo rolled his eyes. “But, uh, if yer offerin’... I wouldn’t mind a lil’ help.”

 

“In gym?” Hanzo quirked his brow as they continued walking.

 

“Nah, nah. More like, English? Please?” A desperate chuckle cut off the casual tone, and Hanzo finally glanced over to his friend. Jesse took the hint to explain further. “Y’know, we got that big essay comin’ up and I ain’t been doin’ too hot - real busy.” A snort from Hanzo interrupted the sentence, but Jesse continued. “You seem like you know what yer doin’ is all.”

 

“I do,” the corners of Hanzo’s lips turned upwards. “What’s in it for me, if I help you?” Jesse’s face fell. 

 

“I’unno, what do you want?” he stuck his lower lip out as Hanzo grinned smugly up at him from a  lower height. The few seconds between his question and Hanzo’s purposely delayed response had him sweating.

 

“I’m joking, Jesse,” he rolled his eyes. “Come to my house after school tomorrow.” Secretly bubbling, Hanzo reached into his bag for a paper and pen. He chewed his bottom lip as he scribbled the address down and slipped the scrap of notebook paper into Jesse’s waiting palm. Caught up in his own mind, he missed Jesse’s last words as the other boy ran off to make it to his next class before the bell. With a content sigh and a lazy wave, Hanzo stepped back inside the building. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i did end up drawing out some Very rough designs for coyote and dragonfly finally, you can check those out [here.](http://burst-bomb-bitch.tumblr.com/post/158763240446/)
> 
> ill hopefully be drawing some of the snowy scenes from this chapter, too, on request from my beta.
> 
> [edit: i did draw one of the snowy scenes! kind of! please check it out [here!](http://burst-bomb-bitch.tumblr.com/post/160893971091/i-mean-if-no-one-else-is-gonna-draw-for-my-fic-u)  
> you can also check out my tag for this au for art and updates, [here.](http://burst-bomb-bitch.tumblr.com/tagged/miraculous-au) ]


	5. Sentai pt. 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jesse and Hanzo's study date is interrupted rather rudely.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> obviously this is late because i had to go back in after the anniversary event and use sentai genji instead!!!!
> 
> but rly,, very sorry for the delay. no lie, i did rewrite about half of this to use sentai genji, but it's not like it was fully written in the first place lmao

McCree reveled in the warmth of the sun kissing at his cheeks as he meandered down the sidewalk - a crumpled scrap of notebook paper sat comfortably crushed in his fist as he looked over the face of the condos lining the road. Hanzo’s address was scrawled in impeccable cursive on the paper, black ink squeezed between blue guides. The address was unnecessary, of course, but that would have sounded creepy if he had said it aloud when Hanzo had offered. He licked his teeth at the memory of Hanzo’s room in the dark, his meek, starstruck attitude so unlike what he was used to seeing. Superheroes had that effect on people, he supposed. A squirm from his jeans pocket distracted him from the pleasant thought - Wenndi. He had ditched his jacket in the heat in favor of a plain white tee and vest. 

 

“I thought that boy didn’t like you?” The Kwami popped its furry muzzle out of the denim bed, squinting up at Jesse in the bright light. He adjusted his hat to give it some shade as he looked down to meet its gaze. 

 

“He doesn’t,” Jesse replied with a snort. “He’s just a real nice guy willin’ to help me out - if I’m gettin’ a little more outta this than he thinks, well, what he don’t know won’t hurt him,” he winked down, and the little dog rolled its eyes. 

 

“You truly are a delinquent.”

 

“If wantin’ to spend a lil’ time with a guy I’m sweet on is a crime, go ahead and lock me up,” the gunslinger chuckled matter-of-factly and tilted his hat back to its original position; Wenndi scrambled back into his pocket in the light. 

 

After a few moments of uncomfortable silence, McCree spoke up again. 

 

“Ain’t like I’m gonna do nothin’ to him. We can just be friends if that’s what he wants,” he fished into the same pocket as Wenndi’s hiding spot for a softened stick of gum. 

 

“No wonder you’re failing English,” Wenndi sighed, exasperated, and kicked at the intruding fingers. The boy just snickered and popped his gum over his tongue. 

 

After a few blocks of bickering, Jesse spotted the same building he had climbed up that one night when he had first discovered the Crusader. It was fully repaired, as all the buildings destroyed that night were - Dragonfly’s pet beasts were incredible. He swallowed hard, sweating both from the weather and the thought of his partner. If Hanzo wasn’t into him, maybe someday he could have a chance with that lovely serpent... Then again, if Hanzo didn’t like him, what chance did he have with a guy like that? With a dissatisfied grunt, he dropped the thought, pushing through the lobby doors and heading for the elevator. 

 

Jesse did end up having to check Hanzo’s note for the apartment number - though, he was proud of himself for remembering the floor correctly, considering he had been hanging onto a balcony for dear life when he had been inside last. He rapped his bare knuckles on the door and heard a scuffle of socks and sweats from somewhere inside. 

 

School had been over for at least an hour, sure, but Hanzo didn’t seem the type to get right into his pajamas when he got home - too organized. With a click, the heavy door opened a crack. A tired eye peered out at him for a moment, then it swung out the rest of the way.

 

“McCree! What are you doing here?” Hanzo’s little brother answered. Genji hung eagerly on the doorframe, leaning out into the carpeted hallway to greet Jesse. He tucked a stray lock of his electric green hair behind an ear, fairly bouncing on his toes. 

 

“I’m-” Jesse began, peeking over Genji’s shoulder into the apartment.

 

“Oh, where are my manners! Come in!” the boy leaned up against the door, moving out of the doorway and grabbing at Jesse’s vest, pulling him closer, over the threshold. “You were saying?” He bit at his lip, looking straight up at Jesse from his position pressed at the door without letting go of his vest. Jesse cleared his throat, hoping the flush on his cheeks wasn’t as visible as it felt. 

 

“I’m, uh...” he coughed; the air suddenly felt warmer in the cooled apartment than the baking sun outside. 

 

“Jesse?” Hanzo’s familiar voice was a sweet relief, and he pulled away from the door frame as Hanzo rounded the corner. “You’re late.” the elder brother pursed his lips as his gaze fell upon Jesse and Genji. 

 

“You’re here... For him?” Genji nearly spat the last word. He grumbled something in Japanese that Jesse didn’t have a prayer of understanding and Hanzo bristled when he heard - he spoke back in the same language, words and sounds falling from his lips like white water rapids as Jesse looked desperately between the two of them. Hanzo noticed his confusion and took a deep breath to calm himself. 

 

“I’m helping him with school work, nothing more,” Hanzo explained in English, gesturing for Jesse to follow him as he made his way to the living room. 

 

“Sure,” Genji rolled his eyes and slammed the front door shut, pushing past the pair in the foyer and continuing to grumble in his first language as he locked himself into his bedroom. Hanzo didn’t comment on the noisy display, but followed his brother’s back with a loathing stare.

 

\--

 

“He called him a delinquent!” Genji raged, raking finely trimmed nails down his cheek and fisting the sheets frumpled atop his bed. “He clearly wasn’t interested, so why is he doing this now?” Genji chewed at his lips, throwing himself down on his stomach and reaching for a lime-green stuffed dragon - it bared its glittery teeth in a non threatening grin, and he pressed his nose to its. 

 

“He just doesn’t wanna see me happy, huh?” he murmured to the creature, averting his eyes from the toy’s all-knowing black beads. “Leaving me all alone, ignoring me, now this? Maybe robots like Hanzo just don’t know how feelings work,” Genji cooed at the dragon like a mother talks to her child. He sighed into its thread whiskers.

 

“Maybe I’m just an embarrassment to him, after all,” he clutched his dragon to his neck, resting his head on one cool white pillow. 

 

“Is it your brother’s attention you want?” A dark voice called to him, leaked through both ears like water after a day of swimming - Genji shivered as the sound seemed to trickle down his back. 

 

“Who said that?” he demanded. The question transcended language, rather burrowing its way behind his eyes than actually speaking to him - Japanese or English, he couldn’t tell.

 

“Who I am is of no consequence,” it assured him, stroking over tear-streaked cheeks. “Do you recall when you were hypnotized, nearly killed by the mighty Crusader? How he finally paid you some mind?” Genji nodded, breathless. How could he not? The toy fell to his lap as he sat up. “Imagine if you could have that on your own.”

 

“And... Jesse?” Genji tugged his bottom lip into his own mouth. It wasn’t the cowboy himself that he needed, but that love and attention he would so shamelessly pour into his older brother - he wanted that, wanted to watch Hanzo fume with rage as it was stolen from him. 

 

“What teenaged boy can resist a ninja?” The misty, ethereal presence that had spoken closed around his throat, and Genji choked. 

 

\--

 

“What’s up with him?” McCree popped a potato chip into his mouth, crunching loudly as Hanzo looked over his half-finished draft. “Y’all don’t seem to get along very good, for brothers. Why, if I had a brother-”

 

“But you don’t,” Hanzo cut him off with a flick of his yellow highlighter, and Jesse stopped mid-sentence, stunned. He recovered quickly, though, and rested his chin on his wrists, looking over Hanzo’s shoulder. The way he chewed his lip as he concentrated, tucked a perfectly smooth lock of hair behind his ear - McCree just wanted to get a little closer, feel the warmth of that flustered pink on his cheeks. 

 

“S’pose yer right,” he chuckled warmly, sighing through his nose. A tiny smile perked the corner of Hanzo’s lip. 

 

“We got along well, back in Hanamura,” the boy continues, unprompted for once. “He’s very indulgent, irresponsible - but he didn’t go out of his way to get in mine. I think the move has been rough on him, to say the least.” Hanzo flipped a heavier mass of his hair over his shoulder.

 

“Not you, though?” the cowboy piqued his brow.

 

“I’ve been rather busy,” Hanzo snorted softly, like he wasn’t telling the whole truth.

 

“Maybe y’all should spend some time together, then. Ain’t nothin’ more important than yer family, Hanzo, gotta take care of ‘em.” McCree munched another handful of chips from the bowl his host had so graciously set on the counter for him.

 

“He’s so fussy recently, stubborn-”

 

“As a mule?” the cowboy offered, and Hanzo hit his shoulder fondly. 

 

“Stubborn as a mule, yes. He-” Their easy conversation was suddenly cut off by a loud thump, like a body falling to the carpet. Hanzo jumped in his seat, fingers stiffening around his pen as an eerie silence followed.

 

“Genji?” Hanzo called, an inkling of worry dripping into his tone. A hiss interrupted the echo of his voice through the hallway, and white steam began to trickle from beneath the door to Genji’s room. Jesse burst out laughing, shattering the mysterious air in the apartment.

 

“Is he  _ smoking _ in there?” 

 

“Why, that little-” Hanzo cut himself off this time with a shout of surprise as the entire door suddenly splintered from its frame. The steam billowed out like tear gas at a riot, the two boys coughed as it enveloped them and the rest of the apartment. Hanzo managed to squint his eyes open, searching the sea of white for a source - the memories it fished up were rather unpleasant, and he was keen to get out as soon as possible. Catching his eye, a pristine white glove reached from the squirming cloud; beneath its fabric there was no give of flesh, only hard, cold steel. Before he could express his surprise, it looped around his neck, squeezing at his throat - he spluttered. Impossibly strong fingers pressed into his jaw below his ears, lifting him from his stool at the counter and inducing a panic like he’d never experienced; he clawed at the hand and tried desperately to scream through the obstruction to his windpipe. 

 

As the steam and smoke began to clear, he saw his attacker. It - or he, Hanzo had a rather hard time recognizing through his terror - was masked in a green helmet, topped with a rather gaudy double-pronged crown. Blue lights offset the green of his armor, peppered around less for utility and more for a comic aesthetic. Two sheathed blades crossed on his back. Hanzo’s attacker looked more like a cartoon supervillain than any other he had faced as Dragonfly so far. As he struggled for air, he began to wonder why exactly he was being targeted as a civilian - the cybernetic man chuckled coldly, and realization hit him.

 

“Genji..?” he gasped, eyes widening as he tried his best to hold himself up by his brother’s wrist. The voice from behind the mask was different than the one he knew so well, but no synthesizer could keep him from recognizing Genji’s laugh. Horror flooded his eyes as Genji dug metal fingertips even deeper into the soft flesh of his throat. Desperately, he searched for Jesse’s help. Movement caught his vision from the corner of his eye: Jesse was twitching closer from his sprawl on the couch.

 

Suddenly, the burly boy launched his entire weight at Genji. With ease, he merely sidestepped and laughed again. Jesse landed in a groaning pile on the floor and Genji tossed Hanzo into the air by his jaw, a shock of pain running through his neck until he was snatched out of midair by his waist like a parlor trick. 

 

“Genji, please! What are you doing?” Hanzo cried anxiously, panting heavily as he regained the ability to breathe, rubbing his throat tenderly. Swallowing a deep breath of air, he did his best to keep from becoming ill at the jerky throw. He kicked at the man’s arm holding him close, but Genji simply knocked his head downwards to meet his brother’s - the metal visor and V-shaped adornment covering his eyes clunked against Hanzo’s forehead and his resistance immediately died down, eyes crossing dizzily. He gasped his brother’s name again as they catapulted towards the large glass living room window and Genji tossed their two bodies from the hole he created. Glass rained down upon them in a fine dust and Hanzo squeezed his eyes shut - before they could tumble down to certain death, the cyborg dug his fingers into the metal accents wrapping the building and slowed them to a stop, beginning to climb back upwards towards the roof.

 

“Hanzo!” Jesse’s mortified face, hair tousled and hat missing, peeked from the shattered pane. 

 

“Stay out of my way,” Genji hissed in his robotic baritone, and Jesse ducked back inside to narrowly avoid being vertically trampled. He clamored upwards with all the grace of a desert lizard, swinging he and Hanzo over the lip to the flat gravel roof and letting Hanzo fall from his grip unceremoniously; he rolled limply to the stone below. His hands shook, his entire body wracked with a faint tremble that he’d never experienced before. He was at the mercy of one of the Reaper’s villains, finally: Toyoll was gone and Coyote was nowhere to be seen. Had his identity been discovered, or was this simply his brother’s own rage? 

 

Fat, hot tears rolled from Hanzo’s eyes, they burned but he forced them open to watch Genji stalk closer, lining up his footsteps - the gravel was his sinister catwalk. Ironically enough, if he hadn’t known any better he would think this man the hero in some cheesy children’s show. He had plenty of fond memories, watching cartoons and superhero shows on Sunday mornings before they were old enough for martial arts training to fill their free time. Even after he had abandoned such childish amusements, Genji had continued to look up to the heroes from his favorite shows. He cut a fitting figure, armor on his torso and legs giving him the silhouette of an action figure, white scarf drifting behind his shoulders. Hanzo bit back a sob as his brother shoved his neck down to the scorching ground, standing back to his full height. He didn’t bother sitting up. 

 

“Is this worth your attention, brother?” He spat the last word menacingly. Hanzo’s bare skin burned in the heat and under Genji’s obscured gaze; he could feel something boiling in his throat. It was expelled outwards as Genji delivered a hard kick into his stomach at the lack of a response, red splashing across the roof and dribbling down his lips. 

 

\--

 

Back inside the wrecked apartment, Jesse slowly recovered from his stumble and shock. His back ached from where he had landed and his head was spinning, but Wenndi rushing from his pocket in a panic sobered him up right away. 

 

“Transform  _ now _ if you don’t want that boy to  _ die _ !” the dog spluttered in one breath, voice fading to a hiss. Jesse nodded in understanding and wrapped his fist around its lean body. 

 

“Transform me!” the rugged heat was familiar enough to be a slight comfort, and he was on the move even as the last of his tail rolled out from his back, towards the two brothers’ bedrooms. Genji’s door was blown open and the frame was cracked, little bits of wooden debris scattered like buckshot in the surrounding hallway - he took the opposing door and found himself in Hanzo’s room for the second time. Faintly, he wondered where their parents slept. 

 

Coyote crossed Hanzo’s bright room in two strides, sliding the door he had entered from the first time open. As he hoisted himself to a balcony the floor above, he caught a glimpse of a blue shimmer atop Hanzo’s bed. Probably just a spare hair ribbon, he reasoned, and continued to climb upwards. 

 

When he reached the roof, a quick glance around told him Genji was nowhere to be found - he had, however, left Hanzo’s body behind in an unsavory condition. Coyote sprinted the surface of the building, skidding to a stop over his friend’s crumpled form, bruised and bleeding. The sun beat down hard on his leather-clad back as he leaned to shade Hanzo’s face from the heat, tilting his cheek gently to the side so that the blood in his mouth didn’t trickle down his throat. A pained moan parted the boy’s lips and his eyelids trembled; he was still mostly conscious.

 

The sound of a throat being cleared drew Coyote’s attention away from Hanzo as he slowly began to open his eyes. 

 

“Get your hands off him, mutt,” the same artificial sound stung his ears and he bristled, following the voice upwards to find Genji perched atop a towering water tank. His glowing boot stood at attention on the downwards swell of the tank, arms crossed and body held in a rather dictator-like posture. 

 

“An’ who’re you?” Coyote glared, looking over his shoulder to face Genji. This time, Jesse was more careful with the names and knowledge he threw around while transformed. He didn’t need the Reaper getting any clues to his identity, not after seeing the violence his minions were capable of. Below, he felt a pressure curl into his glove; he looked down to see Hanzo’s eyes cracked open, lips hidden in his palm as his breathing began to steady in the scent of the leather. A tiny smear of blood discolored his glove, and Coyote swallowed hard as he met Hanzo’s gaze. “I’m gonna getcha’ outta here, sweet pea,” he muttered beneath his breath. 

 

“I told you to get your _ paws _ off of my brother,” the plastic voice was closer this time, made the hair on the back of Coyote’s neck stand up. 

 

“So you can put yers back on ‘im? Do more’a that shit?” he rose to his full height and turned around, flicking the brim of his hat up and drawing his revolver. “Not a chance.” He lined up a shot, but before his finger could come down on the trigger, he thought better about shooting Hanzo’s little brother - this villain seemed too personal, perhaps the Reaper was getting craftier. He could only hope that once Dragonfly arrived he would spare the boy the same mercy.

 

There was a growl from within Genji’s helmet, and his white gloves were suddenly blurs of motion as he gripped the twin handles of the two swords on his back. The long one made a swipe, lightning quick - Coyote threw his white-knuckled fist up just in time for the blade to crash into the barrel of his gun. It left a divot in the metal and Coyote shook his hand out with a hiss as his opponent recovered from the block. With his other side, he jutted out his metal elbow and threw his full weight into Genji’s torso. They both collapsed to the ground, but Coyote retained his position on top, one knee dug into a plate of armor and his metal hand holding Genji’s wrist in a deathgrip. He shook with the effort as the boy thrashed beneath him, snapping hidden teeth.

 

“Get off!” 

 

“Why would you hurt your brother like that?” Coyote bared his teeth back, tightening his bronzed fingers around Genji’s metal wrist.

 

“None of your damn business!” he snarled, bucking upwards and knocking Coyote from his steady hold. 

 

“The hell it ain’t!” Coyote grunted as Genji threw his own weight against him and pinned him to the roof, right next to Hanzo’s body. “It’s my job to save innocent people from monsters like you. Ain’t nothin’ worse than hurtin’ yer kin, they’re all you’ve got!” his breaths came in exerted gasps, and Genji scoffed at the statement.

 

“Innocent! All I’ve got? He’s ignored me since we  _ arrived  _ in this godforsaken country, left me to rot alone!” He rose to his feet from his knees and planted a glowing boot on Coyote’s chest, pressing him further against the broiling roof with every twitch and struggle. “Now he can feel that pain, too.”

 

“And you don’t think you’re overreacting, even a little?” Coyote deadpanned.

 

“Are you mocking me?” Coyote propped himself up on his elbows as Genji’s leg slacked slightly, but he was immediately shoved harshly back to the ground. “No matter... Do you know my brother, Coyote?” Genji twisted his smaller blade into a downwards grip, digging his foot downwards and inspecting the sweat on Coyote’s brow, the anxious swallow visible through his skin as he gave the slightest nod. 

 

“Yeah,” he rasped, capacity for playful banter depleted as the battle became more serious. 

 

“Pity you’ll have to watch him die, then.” The blade came downwards with a deadly force, hovered over Hanzo’s neck rather than Coyote’s. 

 

The movement struck Coyote by surprise, but he recovered fast enough to force his nearest hand beneath the sword’s trajectory - luck had it that the closest hand happened to be metal. It had seemed a trivial part of his costume at first, but Jesse thanked the stars for it now. Genji tugged at where the tip of his weapon was lodged between bronze plates, and Coyote brought back his legs for a buck, kicking Genji’s knees out from under him. Legs crumpled and the boy grunted in surprise as Coyote yanked the sword back for himself, raising it up against Genji’s second, smaller sword. In his other hand, leather twitched around the handle of his revolver, eyes following Genji’s head. The villain laughed.

 

“Don’t wanna hurt you,” Coyote nudged the tip of his gun towards Genji’s last remaining weapon. “Drop it an’ we can just wait for my partner to show up.”

 

“I’m not scared of your little squirt gun,” Coyote’s opponent twitched minutely, bringing his blade to the ready, eyeing the mouth of the revolver. “And you have no idea how to use that sword, I am sure of it.”

 

“Y’think?” Coyote bluffed, lowering the gun. He had no doubt that this villain  _ wasn’t _ afraid of his Peacekeeper - with Genji’s lightning reflexes, Coyote was not interested in finding out what could be done with that little blade of his. Tucking the revolver into its holster went against every instinct he had, common sense shrieking its protest as he assumed the same hold on the sword that Genji had held earlier. He could almost see an eyebrow raise behind the boy’s visor. “Yeah, yer probably right.”

 

Coyote tightened his grip on the wrapped hilt and hacked downwards at Genji’s wrist, catching him momentarily off guard. He yelped as the sword bit into the metal skeleton beneath his glove, sword falling from his fingers; Coyote snatched it from the ground and flung it over the edge of the roof, followed by the larger sword. 

 

There was a moment of silence as Genji processed the situation - then, with a growl of annoyance he shoved past Coyote and leapt off the roof after his weapons. 

 

With barely a second to rest, Coyote knelt to shake Hanzo’s shoulder. His mouth was caked in dry blood and his throat was bruised, but he allowed Coyote to coax him to his feet and pull him towards the door back into the apartment building. 

 

“Gonna get you to the hospital, darlin’, yer gonna be okay,” Coyote assured as he lead him down a flight of stairs - Hanzo dropped his hand. 

 

“You need to take me back to my home,” he demanded, leaning on the railing as Coyote stopped in his tracks to look back up at him. 

 

“Hell are you talkin’ about, Hanzo? You need to see a doctor-”

 

“No!” Hanzo seethed, crossing his arms over his chest. 

 

“Did you hit your head?” Coyote whined, exasperated. “Where d’ya think the first place that asshole’s gonna search for you is?”

 

“A hospital,” Hanzo narrowed his eyes, and Coyote shrank under his gaze. This interaction was distinctly different than their last. 

 

“Okay, you got me. But-”

 

“We don’t have  _ time _ for this, Coyote!” Hanzo threw his hands down to his sides and grabbed a hold of Coyote’s wrist as he descended the stairs as fast as his wobbly legs could take him. “You need to get back out there before Genji discovers where we’ve gone, and I need to get home!” 

 

“Alright, alright!” Coyote submitted, tail between his legs and ears flat against his Stetson as he followed Hanzo’s still somehow elegant path down the stairs, even with his socks torn and dirty. 

 

They made it to the correct floor with only the sound of his heeled boots clicking and echoing in the cement stairwell. Coyote sighed as they pushed out into the hallway and towards the front door to Hanzo’s apartment. It clicked open, still unlocked.

 

Before disappearing inside, Hanzo paused. He looked back over his shoulder to Coyote’s pouting face and slouch. He pursed his lips.

 

“Thank you, Coyote,” he murmured, and the dog perked back up. Hanzo took a step back out into the hallway and before Coyote could even recognize the intrusion in his personal space, there was a chaste press of lips to his stubbled jaw. “You can come back to visit sometime, okay?”

 

\--

 

Stepping over the debris of Genji’s door and the living room window, Hanzo found his way to his own room. The sliding door was open, though he didn’t recall using it recently - more importantly, Toyoll was coiled atop his bed. 

 

“Hanzo! What happened to you?” It moaned in a dramatic, motherly display, crawling atop his chest as Hanzo collapsed into the mattress. “You’re a mess!”

 

“I know,” he sighed, letting his shoulders relax into the comforter. “But I don’t have any time to clean up. Genji will be back for me soon, and Coyote needs help.”

 

“Will you be able to fight in this state?” Toyoll gestured to the dried blood in his mouth, staining his teeth, and the telltale ring of bruises below his jaw. Hanzo rubbed at them sensitively.

 

“I don’t have much choice, do I? Coyote barely got me out of there alive,” his eyes had hardly been open when Genji had slashed his katana for his throat, ready to accept his fate, but Coyote had caught it. That boy was a natural born hero, whoever he was, and he was going to punish Genji for hurting him, hurting them both. Of all the things to get possessed over, his had been a tantrum about an unrequited crush, and the brat had the audacity to try to kill him for it. Hanzo’s blood boiled as he remembered the way his little brother played victim, blaming him for leaving him alone too often, when he had no idea the things Hanzo had done to keep him safe. 

 

“I must say, I would rather not transform you in this state,” Toyoll muttered, catching the murder in Hanzo’s eyes. “You’re agitated and injured, but like you said, there is no choice to make.”

 

“Transform me!” Hanzo called, closing his eyes as they were masked. What had been a pleasant roll in a fresh sheet last time was drowning in one this time, kicking against heavy, ice cold fabric weighing him beneath the surface until, at last, he emerged as Dragonfly once again with a gasp. He wiped a cracked smudge of blood from his lip with his glove and leapt for the roof.

 

Back to his resting ground, he found Coyote, waiting at attention with his jacket dropped to the ground. His hand shielded his eyes as he searched the skyline for any sign of Genji’s return, or presumably, Dragonfly’s. The dog’s eyes nearly popped from his head when he caught sight of his partner in such a state, face smeared with blood and skin pocked with bruises and cuts. Dragonfly disregarded Coyote’s surprise as he approached his side.

 

“What took you so long?” the dragon gave no excuses this time, leaving his lips sealed. “And what the hell did that?” Coyote reached out to grasp Dragonfly’s arm, peppered with little nicks from his tumble through the window and scraped from laying on the gravel roof for so long. 

 

“Not important,” Dragonfly murmured, gently stealing his arm back. 

 

“Darlin’, you shouldn’t be here, lookin’ like that,” Coyote nudged him towards the exit, but Dragonfly refused to budge, raising an eyebrow. He swayed softly on his feet, metal toes pointed inwards and vision foggy in the bright daylight, but he stood as tall as he could, even as his partner urged otherwise.  “This guy’s worse than yer thinkin’, doll, I promise.”

 

“But you cannot fight him alone,” Dragonfly responded matter-of-factly, watching for Coyote’s reaction. He faltered.

 

“Well, no,” the gunslinger grasped fruitlessly for a way to continue the thought and support his own argument, but Dragonfly was interrupting with a soft, sure huff before he could get another word out.

 

“I can,” Coyote balked in disbelief.

 

“You ain’t even seen what he can do yet!” He protested as the serpent stepped further away, towards the edge of the roof spattered with brown blood.

 

“Do you doubt me, Coyote?” Dragonfly hissed, looking back over his shoulder to meet Coyote’s anxious gaze with a molten hot glare. “I will take him on, and I will win.” Before Coyote could object again, they were called to attention by the scuffling of rocks as Genji clawed his way back to their battleground. 

 

“Where did you hide my brother?” the masked villain demanded, charging towards the pair - his swords were both replaced on his back. Coyote opened his mouth to answer, but Dragonfly was moving forward yet again to meet Genji’s challenge.

 

“Somewhere you’ll never find him, scum,” Dragonfly spat, lips tinted a wet red. He narrowed his eyes. His partner winced - so much for mercy. Slowly, he pulled his gun, but kept it at his side. Now, his partner’s defiance rather reminded him of Hanzo’s demands in the stairwell, so sure of his own needs and abilities. Who was he to intrude on a battle that was not his?

 

Genji drew his katana, no worse for wear after its fall. The edge was lit with neon blue light, in line with his comical appearance. Practical effects in cheap children’s television were never graphic - their fight would not be the same, if Dragonfly got his say.

 

He drew his own blade. More so than usual, it felt light and airy in his grip, rather an extension of his own limbs than a weapon. He could feel a flicker of electricity run down his arm, dragons anxious to meet their prey.  _ Soon enough _ , he promised.

 

The comic book villain made the first official move in their game, dashing forwards with a precise aim at his opponent’s midsection. His gut burned, but Dragonfly dodged to the side of the swipe with a duck, kicking out his metal boot as Genji passed and tripping him up onto his back. He tumbled through the dust, scowling as Dragonfly planted one heavy boot upon his chest and pressed down; he grabbed at his ankle and tugged with his full weight. 

 

Dragonfly took the second fall and Genji climbed atop him, pinning him to the ground with flat palms on his shoulders and knees on either side of his legs. The wicked edge of his sword cut dangerously close to Dragonfly’s cheek - he ducked his head the opposite direction and thrust his knee upwards between Genji’s legs. 

 

A hollow metal echo resonated from beneath the spandex, and Genji froze momentarily, grip on his sword loosening. The slip-up was just enough for Dragonfly to roll out from underneath his pin, hacking his katana down into Genji’s armored back. Enchanted, the blade cut through the armor like warm butter, all the way down into his brother’s skin. 

 

Dragonfly stiffened when a spray of a viscous green liquid fell upon his cheek and mouth, accompanied by Genji’s artificial, pained screech. A creamy neon color, the goo was more like slime than the blood that should have clouded the air. Allowing his opponent a moment of rest, he merely observed his brother’s labored breathing, twitching as he inhaled and his wound expanded. Dragonfly spat Genji’s taste from his lips and Genji weakly flipped himself to hide his injured back, fingers flexing on the grip of his weapon. 

 

“You play dirty,” the boy hissed, wobbling back onto his feet and assuming a ready stance.

 

“I’m not the antagonist here,” Dragonfly snarled, breathing heavily through his mouth. His stomach was in knots and his neck ached, exertion finally beginning to catch up to his injuries. The masked man cocked his head in amusement, looking over his weakening body.

 

“We’ll see about that,” he dashed forward again, a mirror of his failed move, but this time, Dragonfly was too sluggish to dodge. A wide cut opened on his bare shoulder, wrenching a scream that he tried his best to swallow on his way down to his knees. Blood trickled down the elegant curves of his dragon tattoo - at least his was red. It burned in the open air, heat dripping down his arm until it was nigh numb. When he looked back to Genji with a scowl, pressing his loose sleeve into the wound, his sword was raised high. 

 

“Do your worst,” the serpent licked his lips, pushing himself up to stand straight. His arm panged with every slight jostle; he swapped the grip of his sword to his other hand. 

 

With an extravagant sweeping motion and an angry call in Japanese, Genji drew forth a dragon of his own. It snarled, teeth bared a ghastly green and claws swiping the air as it perched at the ready upon his shoulder, half fused to his blade. Dragonfly couldn’t help but think what a fitting opponent he had been faced with.

 

“A traitor?” he snorted grimly, but he knew that his dragons, Toyoll’s, were loyal creatures. A mere imitation could never best them. Standing steady on his own feet, Dragonfly held his own sword out in front of him. “Ryu ga waga teki wo kurau!” 

 

The dull buzz that had sat behind his eyes, ghosting the tip of his tongue, morphed into an electrical shock. He felt his skin buzz, his tattoo felt burning hot as the two beasts showed their allegiances, they hovered behind his shoulders. The spirits, in their rawest power, crackled through his arms. They licked at his wounds; the slice on his arm knitted itself closed as they prepared, flowing downwards until they were imbued in his sword.

 

“Three against two,” Genji whispered, reverting to Japanese. “You do fight dirty.”

 

“You should have known better than to challenge your elder,” Dragonfly replied likewise, remorse missing from his tone. He lunged forwards, swiping his blade through the air, and the dragons followed like loyal hunting dogs. They tackled Genji to the ground, tearing through his armor as he screeched. Sparks flew, but no more of the green goo was produced - the spirits did not break his skin, but left scars elsewhere. His visor and helmet fell with a crack to the ground, leaving only the terrified face of a young boy. Following up with his sword, Dragonfly cut a vicious gash along Genji’s jaw, drawing forth a choked cry as green spewed from the wound. 

 

“Stop it, get off of him!” A loud voice came into focus through the haze of battle; Coyote, shaking at his shoulders, grabbing at his sword as his dragons shot upwards to fulfill the rest of their duties. 

 

“He needs to be cleansed,” Dragonfly spat, but Coyote managed to wrestle his sword away.

 

“Look at him! He’s just a kid,” Coyote growled, grabbing onto his partner by the chin - his eyes were glazed over and he panted, stank of sweat and exertion. “I’m taking him home.”

 

“No,” Dragonfly suddenly interrupted as Coyote reached to pick up his limp body - the armor had melted away into dust, blown away on the wind, and only Genji was left in his tattered pajamas, breathing weakly “I will.” 

 

“How can I trust you?” Coyote knitted his brows. A question he had hoped never to ask of his partner. 

 

“You have my sword,” Dragonfly rolled his eyes and shoved Coyote aside, lifting Genji’s pliable body with little care. Coyote tried to call after him, but he was already halfway through the door to the stairs. 

 

\--

 

Unceremoniously, Hanzo dropped his brother’s body on the couch. The floors were free of glass and the doors were repaired, so the dragons had done their job, as always. As he stumbled towards the kitchen for a cup of tea and a handful of aspirin, Toyoll shot from his pocket and into his field of vision. Its furry whiskers twitched and its eyebrows were knitted.

 

“How dare you!”

 

“How dare I?” Hanzo yawned. 

 

“You used your strength so frivolously, Hanzo! I thought you were better than that,” the serpent looked more mournful than angry. “Just look what you’ve done to your poor brother!”

 

“He attacked  _ me _ -!” Hanzo protested, but the Kwami was having none of it.

 

“ _ Look _ at him!” Toyoll dragged its tiny needle claws across his cheek and Hanzo hissed. He silently followed back to the couch and kneeled next to Genji’s unconscious body. The cut across his jaw had not faded, blood still drying all the way down his neck. Hanzo swallowed guiltily, sobered from his battle as he drank in the unintended aftermath.

 

“Why didn’t the dragons fix it?” his toes curled as he forced his eyes to stay on the wound, looking up to Toyoll for guidance.

 

“They cannot fix damage that they themselves have caused, my dragonling,” Toyoll adjusted its volume to match the quiet regret of Hanzo’s. “They cannot mend what you have caused in your own anger.”

 

Hanzo looked down at his fingers, stained with a mix of sticky green and red and swallowed thickly. 

 

“I’m sorry, Genji,” he muttered after a long moment of silence, pressing his forehead down into his brother’s stomach. 

 

A metal hand curled around his throat. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please check out my [tag](http://burst-bomb-bitch.tumblr.com/tagged/miraculous-au) for art and updates!


	6. Sentai pt. 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hanzo and his brother have a bit of a disagreement.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hoo boy. okay ya'll. thank you so much for all the kind comments, i really do want to finish this for you. i went through my outline and restructured all the chapters to make it a little simpler for myself to complete, we're gonna be missing out on a few akumas but i think that's the price we gotta pay to finish, yeah?

“Do not fear, brother,” a voice sneered through the black spots clouding Hanzo’s vision. His skin was numb, but his neck burned as steel crushed his larynx. He let out a choked sob, unable to focus as his body trembled below Genji’s clenched fist. Light bled into his skull through the open window and his bones ached as spit flew in little drops from his cracked lips. “My quarrel is no longer with you.”

 

As the last mechanical syllable left his brother’s lips, it all stopped. Hanzo fell to the floor with a tremendous gasp, choking out blood and spit and panicking for air before he could even think to consider Genji’s words. Tears flowed freely from his swollen lids, sniffling pathetically as he allowed the monstrous cyborg to roll a boot gently over his shoulder and push him to the ground with the utmost delicacy. Face pressed into the area rug, Hanzo glanced upwards. 

 

“I have a bug to squash.”

 

With that, the masked man crouched down, brushing a bloody, greasy clump of Hanzo’s normally impeccable hair behind his ear. There he left him, panting and sobbing on the floor as he did his best to blink the impending void from his eyes.

 

\--

 

Minutes, maybe hours later, Hanzo dared to sit up.

 

Blood rushed from his head and he groaned, dropping his face into his lap with a defeated slurp of the blood dripping down his nose and lips. 

 

“Oh, dragonling...” the gentle, pitying coo from his Kwami prompted a sickly sob. He coughed into his bloody hands, smearing tears down his ruddy cheeks with his palms. 

 

“What have I done?” Hanzo rasped, cracking his eyes open to search Toyoll’s. The dragon’s snout sat level with his sniffling, perched upon a stained couch cushion. The light was gone from the sky; their faces were painted a deep, sickly green in the shade of the night sky - was he seeing things? “Why is he still like this?”

 

“As the anger remains, so too does the evil. I would love to comfort you now, Dragonfly,” Toyoll began, then sighed. “But we do not have the time. You must defeat your kin once more.”

 

The words burned Hanzo’s ears. His horrified gasp of air gave away his opinion, and Toyoll softened.

 

“It is your duty, Hanzo. No one else is capable-”

 

“I can’t! I won’t!” he choked, digging his nails into the flesh of his cheeks. “Not Genji, not  _ again _ ...”

 

“Are you not responsible for this mess?” Toyoll scolded, and Hanzo glared back at it. 

 

“Aren’t you as well?” A flame flickered to life in his chocolate eyes and Toyoll balked.

 

“Excuse me?”

 

“I never asked for this, you filthy snake!” The floodgates opened, and the trickle that had run down his cheeks before was now a river. “I didn’t ask for this duty, didn’t ask for you to tear my brother and I apart!”

 

“Dragonling...” the Kwami mumbled, hushed in the back of its throat. 

 

“Don’t call me that,” he pointed towards the door. “Go.”

 

“Hanzo, I cannot-” and as the serpent opened its mouth, Hanzo reached up. “Don’t!” The ribbon in his hair fluttered to the ground, and there was silence.

 

\--

 

“Puppy? Here, puppy!” 

 

Jesse shivered at the mechanical croon, swallowing down a lump. Light in the sky was fading fast, sucked into the wind that swirled around the rooftop. Delicate footsteps, feignedly light on the gravel there inched closer, tortuously slow. The hero gave into the cramping behind his ribs, whispering out the breath he had been holding inside, breaking down into pants. His gilded claws shook, scrabbling against the sheet metal of the venting unit he trembled behind. Without his partner, Genji was suddenly a much more formidable opponent, especially as he painted the world an angry, sick green around them. 

 

Something must have happened, on the way back to Genji’s apartment. The purification must have gone wrong, Dragonfly was unprepared - Coyote grimaced to think that he may be lying hurt and alone in some stairway, or worse: much, much worse. 

 

“Naughty boy, aren’t you?” The sour silk of the cyborg’s voice curdled in Coyote’s ears like snake venom and he whipped his gaze upwards to where Genji lounged over the top of his hiding place. Desperately, he lunged forwards, rolling away, but a set of wicked claws grasped the scruff of his coat, tugging him back and up into the air without mercy.

“Lemme down!” he snarled as Genji stood to his full height, kicking and bucking in his grip as he was crudely dangled. 

 

“Mister Coyote, I haven’t even had a chance to properly introduce myself!” the helmet atop his body cocked to the side playfully. “You wouldn’t want to be rude, would you?” Coyote just bared his teeth, searching the eerie sky behind his captor’s head for some sign of help. 

 

“No,” he growled sarcastically. “Please, do go on.”

 

“My pleasure! My name is Green Sentai, and I’ll be taking over your hero duties from now on.” 

 

“Whaddya-” Coyote scrunched his brows, ceasing his kicking for just a moment in his confusion.

 

“Please, let me finish,” Sentai held up his free hand in a halting motion, and Coyote snapped his jaw shut, thoroughly baffled. “After our last run in together, my creator and I have decided that you and your partner are no longer fit to protect this city - too violent and aggressive for how a hero ought to act.” the open hand rose to his helmet, releasing a hiss of steam from his neck joints as the visor part of his helmet slid smoothly out of view. 

 

Genji’s flesh was deathly pale, clammy beneath the mask. His strong jaw was marred by a long, ugly scar, healed quickly from his debacle with Dragonfly earlier in the day, but still painful to look at. 

 

“Am I overreacting this time?” he whispered, just audible over the whistle of winds. Coyote swallowed thickly, averting his eyes. “My creator has an offer for you, doggy.”

 

“Your creator... The Reaper, you mean?” he looked back up to meet Genji’s wet eyes. Was he still in there, behind the dead flesh and hydraulics, the energetic boy he had met on the school steps? 

 

“The very same,” his smile was small, sad. “He will give you one deal, and one alone: surrender your Miraculous, and you will be spared. Saved, even. You could come to serve him with me.”

 

Coyote bared his teeth once more, throat and eyes hot as he spat to the roof below. Genji sighed.

 

“Then...” he pouted. “Perish.” 

 

\--

 

Outside, the once-warm city felt cold and ghastly. Hanzo tucked his trembling hands into his jacket pockets, taking each step along the sidewalk slow and measured as he swallowed thickly every few seconds, doing his best to keep the tears at bay. His blood throbbed beneath his skin, marred with cuts around his throat, and his shoulders sat high upon his neck, hidden in his hood, protecting his flesh from the outside world. 

 

An ugly green glow cast itself upon the city, just like he had suspected. His shadow on the ground was a writhing bruise, and the color upon his clammy skin made him sick. What was Genji doing?

 

As much as he told himself he was out to clear his mind in the not-so-fresh air, Hanzo instinctively found himself wandering deeper into the city. The streets were barren, devoid of life as he pushed his way through the shadows cast by looming buildings. A humming din hovered in his ears, and it was unclear if it came from within his head or the city around him. Further he ventured into the irradiated smog of the town, and louder it became, buzzing behind his eyes as he slowly looked upwards. A few strangers trotted the street alongside him now, all moving in one direction with a sense of urgency, weaving between still cars and disregarding the sidewalks as more and more joined their unaware ranks. Not one ventured a glance at him, nor the sky, eyes glued forwards. Their silence was rather uncomfortable, like their footsteps were shaking the ground beneath his feet as he sped up just slightly, following the gradual flood of patrons in the road. He swallowed thickly as his own pack of citizens was joined by another in a similar state, always walking forwards as the people around him swelled in number. 

 

When the man in front of him - lanky and dressed in casual business attire - came to a stop, Hanzo nearly knocked into his sweaty back. The people around him stopped just as suddenly, and he dared a look around. They had arrived at a normally-bustling intersection, filling every little crack between stalled cars with doors hanging open; the very epicenter of the swirling, demonic green hue of the sky spiraling from an office building before the crowd. Many stories above were a pair of figures, which Hanzo recognized with a sinking feeling in his gut. The people around him cheered with deafening roars, the sound of their screams audible from blocks away as they stacked atop vehicles and climbed lamp posts for a better view of the action above.

 

Coyote dangled precariously over the edge, held only by the fist gripping his jacket. Hanzo couldn’t hear a word above the deafening roar of the crowd, nor through the massive height disparity between his frozen-stiff self on the ground and his partner kicking and yelling above, but he had a premonition that he was not especially pleased with the situation. Holding Coyote solidly in one hand and balancing his own bodily weight over the drop was Genji, unmasked and swathed in latex as the city egged him on. 

 

When his hand released, the world stood still. 

 

The crowd below cleared a landing area on the pavement, and Hanzo dove through their ranks. Glazed stares followed his back as he shoved patrons aside, only to be shoved back down as though he weighed no more than a feather. He glanced down, horrified, to the little white hand on his stomach, belonging to a girl no older than four. Her eyes were unfocused, grip on his sweatshirt deathly as other fingers and appendages from the crowd began to absorb his body back in. 

 

“Let me go..!” he screeched as he was suddenly lifted from his feet by a man twice his size, sharing the same frostbitten gaze of the rest of the crowd. No answer came but the excited cheers as Coyote tumbled through the air. Helpless in his many captors’ grips, Hanzo averted his eyes from the clearing; he didn’t want to hear the thump, the spray of pink mist in the air. Dogs didn’t land on their feet. 

 

A sound like a whip cracking assaulted Hanzo’s ears over the din, and the crowd fell into a hush. Glass rained down upon them from the skyscraper from which Coyote had been thrown; a window burst into shards by a... hook? Down from it swung a silver chain, taut in the air as a delicate figure dangled sharply from its ending - a graceful mess of white lace and black feathers. 

 

A woman, tall and slender, sailing towards his partner’s terrified form still dropping like a stone. A long arm, tucked under his shoulders in one fluid motion as their paths crossed. A purple gas, swelling rapidly as it leaked from a canister on her wrist. She stuck the landing, just as Hanzo felt his arms released from behind. 

 

He blinked burning tears from the corners of his eyes, falling to his knees as the mist spread through the crowd, yielding similar effects upon the brainwashed mass of patrons. 

 

By the time it had cleared, the woman had vanished, leaving a single black feather upon the asphalt where Coyote would have fallen. Above it stood the dog himself, frozen in awe with a tiny black peck of lipstick upon his cheek. 

 

“Coyote!” Hanzo called, and the pup was shaken from his stupor. This time, as he fought to shove past his peers, they were malleable and hazy; as though they had just woken from a long and rather peaceful sleep.

 

“Hanzo!” Coyote replied with a giddy yip, chasing him down through the slowly recovering mob and sweeping him from his feet. “We gotta get you outta here, gotta find Dragonfly...” A lump of guilt caught in Hanzo’s chest.

 

“Are you alright?” he asked gently, pressing a hand to his partner’s ruddy cheek. Coyote pressed into the touch with an exhausted grin.

 

“I’ll be fine, darlin’, don’t you worry. Me’n Dragonfly, we’re gonna kick that guy’s spandex ass, y’hear?” Hanzo winced, but nodded once. 

 

“I... I’m sure,” he murmured as Coyote set him back down to his feet in the shelter of his shadow. The crowd was regaining their senses, spreading meekly away from the two boys in their midst as they were recognized. “You should get out of here,” Hanzo interjected quickly, before the curious onlookers could voice any possible suspicions towards his identity. “Get to safety.” He was reluctant to point Coyote towards Dragonfly, as he didn’t presently exist.

 

“Hanzo?” There was a worn leather glove cupping his cheek, when had that happened? He sniffed, and a thumb brushed away a fat tear from the crease of his nose. How long had he been crying?

 

“I’m just...” Hanzo shoved Coyote’s gentle hands away, less harshly than he would have liked. He was a lot of things - overwhelmed, exhausted, aching and bruised, relieved at his partner’s continued life, anxious over the outcome of Genji’s. “I had a fight. With my brother.” he muttered lamely, tucking his hands out of sight and refusing to meet Coyote’s concerned eyes. 

 

“I had, uh,” Coyote knitted his brows. “A bit of’n altercation with’im myself,” he glanced upwards, to where Genji’s shadow had vanished. “Not to ignore yer feelins or nothin’, but I think gettin’ the both of us out of here is the best thing I can do right now.” Hanzo sucked in a shaky breath and wiped the tears and grime from his face, nodding passively. With a prayer that Genji, or god forbid, the Reaper, didn’t have eyes on them, Coyote lead the both of them towards the safest place he could think of. 

 

\--

 

After a few minutes of silent walking, they arrive at a rather nice looking condo development, to Hanzo’s surprise. Coyote had always struck him as sort of a wild wanderer, more likely to live in a shack in the desert than somewhere like this - though, he realized that was a rather unfair assumption. He lead the two of them up to a pristinely white entrance, heralded by faux columns on either side of the door and a black mat; Coyote crouched down and fished for a key beneath it. With a click of the tumblers, they were inside. 

 

On instinct, Hanzo kicked off his shoes at the entrance, and Coyote chuckled, trotting ahead into a kitchen - white and shiny as the door had been. The entire home was eerily clean, the only proof that anyone lived inside was a fully stocked refrigerator and a grocery list tacked to it. A few scattered picture frames adorned a stone mantle, visible from the kitchen as he watched Coyote fish through the contents of the fridge with a dissatisfied grunt. Silently, he slipped towards the parlor to have a look - it felt a little wrong, knowing his partner’s secret identity could possibly be on the wall just in front of him, but he was curious as to the type of person he had been spending his nights with. In most of the pictures was a face he recognized, though not one he had been expecting. He blinked and held in a rude gasp as he took in the features of the very person that had welcomed him to the city. 

 

Jack Morrison. 

 

“Friend’a mine,” came a grunt from over Hanzo’s shoulder, Coyote with an unreadable expression behind his mask, offering out a bottle of water he had found. Hanzo nodded with red cheeks at his red hands, but pushed the bottle back towards Coyote. “Keeps a room here for me, in case I need it,” he followed up, “C’mon.” With the bottle still in his gloved hand, he lead his guest back to another white door, down the hall from the entrance. Inside was more of the type of living space Hanzo had expected - a messy room, flannel shirts tossed into a pile in the corner and a rumpled bed. 

 

Coyote gestured towards the bed, and Hanzo sat as he rifled through the mostly-empty closet. There was a pile of untouched notebooks and pens on a small desk in the corner opposite the bed, and a disorganized pile of textbooks. So Coyote was a student as well..? 

 

“Damn Jack, keeps movin’ my shit,” a grumble interrupted his train of thought. “Stay there.” Coyote disappeared out the door again, only to return moments later with a small white case. Hanzo was grateful for the lack of moments he had been left entirely alone - if given the time to reflect on all that had happened that day, he was sure he would cry again, or collapse, or both. 

 

Coyote threw himself down on the bed next to Hanzo, clicking the lock of the case open and shrugging his jacket from his shoulders. As he reached inside, Hanzo took the time to size up what he was just realizing was a man he hardly knew - tan skin wrapped his bare arms, a leather holster ‘round his hips, calloused hands reaching for his face -

 

Hanzo jumped, eyes popping wide as a bandage was settled on his neck, but settled into the warmth provided by his partner’s now-gloveless fingers, smoothing down the adhesive. He had nearly forgotten about his own wounds, barely an ebb in the back of his whirling train of thought. Lifting his chin slightly earned him a satisfied smile. 

 

“What happened?” 

 

“My brother,” Hanzo admitted, truthfully. “I am thankful that he did not to to me what...  _ Dragonfly _ , did to him,” his voice fell to a guilty whisper. 

 

“‘Course you heard about that...” Coyote winced. “I tried to keep ‘im from hurtin’ Genji too bad, swear on it.” He raised a hand. “Probably coulda done more, though...” He lowered it. 

 

“That was not your duty,” Hanzo hissed sourly under his breath. “He is responsible for his own actions.”

 

“C’mon now, try not to be too hard on him,” Coyote held out a hand to bring Hanzo’s gaze to meet his own.  “I’unno what about Genji made him so angry, but I know him. I think..” he took a deep breath. “He’s a good guy. I know that.”

 

“I don’t know if I can believe that,” Hanzo whispered, thinking back to the image of his brother, limp and bleeding on their couch, then to the rage coursing through the cybernetic fingers choking the life out of him, and how much it felt like he  _ deserved _ it.

 

“I swear, Hanzo. He’s been nothin’ but a good partner ta me, and damn, I’d look like a shit person too if’n you just saw some of the things I ain’t proud of.” He stiffened. 

 

“What if you don’t know him as well as you think you do?” There were tears blooming at the corners of Hanzo’s eyes again, he blinked them back best he could. “What if he has some horrible past that no one knows about?”

 

Hanzo was not a newcomer to the world of causing pain. He knew that feeling of slicing flesh, ignoring his own injuries and testing his grit and prowess against another living being, leaving them cut down on the ground just for a spar far better than any young boy should. His father and clan had taught him ruthlessness - but he was supposed to be a different person here, have a new beginning. He could have left his violence and aggression and control back in Japan and lived the life of a normal person, if only for a few weeks. That chance was gone now, blown away in the wind behind Genji, with a scar on his brother’s tender cheek to remind him of it every time they met -

 

“Don’ matter much to me.” Coyote’s drawl broke Hanzo’s reverie. 

 

“But-” His fingers clutched his ankles, eyes straining as he butted back into the conversation. 

 

“Now, I ain’t sayin’ he’s guiltless for whatever it is he mighta done,” Coyote continued, sensing the restlessness beneath Hanzo’s skin, and absently scratched a hand through the rough baby hairs at his chin. “But all I know is Dragonfly’s one of the bravest, smartest people I’ve ever had the pleasure’a workin’ with, and that’s all I need.”

 

“Brave...” Hanzo took a breath through his teeth, squeezing his tucked knees into his stomach on Coyote’s bed. He didn’t want to push the issue further, risk exposing his identity, but he had so many questions of his partner now - was he really something more than an unfortunate coward with a dark past? He couldn’t tell where Coyote was gleaning this information, but he felt his cheeks turn hot whenever he dared glance up to meet the boy’s masked eyes - that dreamy smile...

 

“I need to get home.”

 

“Huh?”

 

“Coyote,” Hanzo took a deep breath. “I need you to take me back to my apartment.” The dog’s brows knitted. 

 

“I don’t think that’s such a good idea, sugarplum,” he grinned nervously, loosing his hat with one hand and taking it down to cross over his chest cautiously. “Probably gon’ be the first place yer brother’s lookin’ for the both of us.”

 

“I know,” Hanzo sighed, preparing to pull a dangerous card from his deck. “But... Isn’t that also where you last saw Dragonfly?”

 

\--

 

After tidying up the rumpled bed and Coyote worriedly chugging a bottle of ginger ale from Jack’s fridge, it was another brief scamper back to where the day’s incident had all began. The sun had long set, slivers of moonlight dripping weakly through the soft-edged cracks in the haze of green, few and far between. Hanzo let Coyote guide him in the dark, let him hold his hand tight in a firm grip; he relaxed into the gentle exchange of heat between their skin, defying the cold, clammy atmosphere. The dog’s gloves remained discarded in his jacket pocket in favor of soothing his charge with delicate squeezes as they ventured, silently as humanly possible, back into the breach. 

 

The swirling, choking vortex of smoggy green wind had relocated, along with its master, to the top of the unassuming apartment building Hanzo and his brother had been perfectly content inside mere hours before. More swarming people hobbled aimlessly through the street, blank expressions seeming to ignore the two travelers, but they remained cautious all the same. They took the back alleys, climbing piles of garbage and dodging packs of rats in the consuming darkness. Heroics weren’t turning out to be as glamorous as Hanzo had first thought. 

 

Finally, they arrived at the rear end of a building they somewhat recognized in the din - Coyote more so than Hanzo. He guided his friend’s hands towards the wrought iron of the fire escape, and instinct took over in the dark. Hanzo climbed, following the inkling of light above his head, and Coyote followed. They ascended steadily, silently, until Hanzo paused abruptly at a cracked window, pulling himself up onto the landing. 

 

“This one,” he whispered. Coyote didn’t recognize the floor himself, but then again, he hadn’t dangled within an inch of his life on this particular side of the building. Hanzo shimmied his thin fingers beneath the sill as Coyote closed the distance between them on the ladder, hopping up to stand next to him, just as the window popped free. Hanzo squeezed his shoulders through the opening and rolled inside. 

 

Inside, the room was still pristinely white. A spring green pair of drapes sat to either side of where he sat on the rug; he stood out of the way so that Coyote could join him. The bed was plush and unmade, a small stuffed toy that Hanzo couldn’t help but recognize with a fond pang in his chest sat atop the rumpled comforter. He stepped nearer, taking the tattered green serpent into his arms, against his chest. After this disaster of a day was over - if it came to an end, that was - Hanzo knew he had apologies for his brother. Not just for physically assaulting him, but for the ignorance of his feelings as they both struggled in this new place, for disregarding his anger and despair, for keeping secrets. How Dragonfly could make up for  _ his _ atrocious behavior, Hanzo was unsure, but he would find a way. 

 

“Hanzo?” Coyote called softly from over his shoulder as he was lost in his thoughts again, reminding him that there was still much to be done before he could repair his relationship with his little brother. 

 

“I’m fine,” he rasped. “Go find Dragonfly. I have something I need to do.”

 

“Are you sure?” Coyote cocked a brow. “I can stay-”

 

“No, Coyote. Go,” Hanzo looked over his shoulder to the wary pup. “He needs you more than I do.”

 

“If you insist,” Coyote conceded, tipping the brim of his hat in a mock-salute and drifting past Hanzo’s stiff posture to the bedroom door. As they crossed eyes, he took up Hanzo’s hand in his once more, giving it an affectionate, warm squeeze. He glanced down at their interlocked fingers with a longing, and Hanzo, surprised, tightened his grip back before tucking both of his arms behind his back, toy dragon in tow.

 

“Go! Hurry.” 

 

Coyote disappeared from the room, and Hanzo waited a moment, taking a deep breath and laying the toy back down onto Genji’s bed before drifting back out into their apartment.

 

Despite the relative cleanliness of his brother’s bedroom, the house was a mess. The window in the parlor was shattered all over the ground, which in turn was dribbled with remains from his own body - droplets of blood from his cheeks, saliva and sweat from where Genji had nearly suffocated him on the couch. He grimaced and avoided looking towards the scene as best he could - he had a goal, and a time limit now; when Coyote failed to find Dragonfly’s battered body in the stairwell, he would return. Dragonfly couldn’t be in the apartment, nor should Hanzo. 

 

With a deep breath to clear his mind, Hanzo knelt into the fire. His fingers shook as they delicately skimmed the rug for the telltale silk of his Miraculous. They brushed a familiar texture, and Hanzo let out the air he had been holding as a puff of smoke appeared in the warzone.

 

“Toyoll?” he whispered softly, meekly.

 

“My Dragonling!” the little beast cried in delight, dashing up to sit upon his holder’s bowed neck and rub into his clammy skin. “I was so worried!”

 

“I’m sorry,” Hanzo sighed, bringing his golden silk scarf upwards to tie into his hair as the Kwami lavished his ear with beard tickles. “I shouldn’t have been so irresponsible, I should never have left you behind.”

 

“Are you alright? Did something happen?” the dragon paused, and Hanzo shook his head. 

 

“I’m fine. Coyote is a little shaken, but fine-”

 

“You were with Coyote?” Toyoll balked, Hanzo nodded. “You didn’t.. Reveal yourself, did you?” the Kwami narrowed its bright little eyes, and Hanzo couldn’t help but let out a chuckle.

 

“No, no. Now’s not the time, Toyoll, he’ll be coming back soon, and we have work to do.” he took a steadying breath. “Transform me!”

 

\--

 

The cool air on the roof was anything but refreshing. 

 

Dragonfly stood solidly, facing up to the massive disturbance in the air around them - melty green smog, whipped up like some sort of monstrous meringue batter made out of the very air he tried to breathe. Genji was nowhere to be seen - yet - but he could hear the clanking of metal stairs and spurs that told him Coyote was nearby. 

 

When the door from the utility stairs burst open, Dragonfly’s attention was drawn in two directions at once. 

 

One, as a panting Coyote skidded out onto the gravel of the roof with the tails of his coat flapping behind him. His glove was replaced on his tan fingers, and his eyes lit up as his partner came into view, alive and well.

 

The other, as a pair of heavy metal boots dropped hard and fast onto the roof, practically shaking the building beneath them. A mechanical laugh tinkered at the two boys as Genji, or Sentaiman, rose up to his full height and crossed his green-armored hands over his padded chest. 

 

“Come for a rematch?” Dragonfly called over the whistling wind as Coyote trotted up to his side. 

 

“What else?” the voice that came from the tall figure was most definitely not that of his brother. His synthesizer almost seemed to be breaking up, hissing and whining with sand in his transmitter and a dark force melting his aluminum chords. “I won’t be so easy this time, pest.”

 

“I would expect nothing less,” Dragonfly stood to his full height and brushed Coyote a few steps behind his own protection. 

 

“I won’t be merciful,” the bot grinned from within its head, all blackness and no Genji. 

 

“That’s what I deserve,” Dragonfly retorted calmly, drawing his sword with the sheath still attached, and dropping the whole thing to the ground. The gold of the handle and peeking blade glinted in the messy ocean of shadows surrounding them, and Sentai scoffed. 

 

“Don’t think you’ll earn my sympathy, Dragonfly,” he took a confident step forwards, drawing his own blade with a sickeningly sharp  _ sching _ and pointing it with an accusatory stiffness at his opponent’s bowed head. “Defend yourself!” he growled, predatory, and lunged forwards.

 

Before his brother’s blade could meet his flesh, Dragonfly whipped the bow from his back and brought it down hard, rather blindly, in front of him. A sickening clang of metal reverberated through the air as its gilded shape caged the tip of Sentai’s sword; the villain snarled and ripped his arm back ferociously. Without a moment of rest, he thrust the sword at his opponent once more, aiming higher. Another crash shook them as Dragonfly knocked Sentai’s blade unsteady, diving for his planted feet as he drew back, dizzy. He bashed at Genji’s knees with the solid middle grip of his bow, but was met only with an empty metal echo from within his armor; Sentai returned with a solid stomp to his chest that knocked the air out of him on passing.

 

As Dragonfly lay on the ground, trying his best to catch his breath, Sentai stood over him with a hidden expression, but a hungry pant from behind his mask. No hesitation wavered the tip of his blade as he stood haughty over Dragonfly’s body, and the hero squeezed his eyes shut. He had been too confident, had taken an unnecessary risk -

 

A solid, metal thump broke the sound of their shared labored breathing.

 

Dragonfly opened his eyes with a start, only to shield them with his arms as Sentai’s heavy form crumpled on top of him. When he looked up again, Coyote stood above the both of them with a big rock. Sentai whimpered from within his armor, helmet dented in the shape of Coyote’s weapon, and Dragonfly felt for a release around his neck from beneath his weight. He pressed his fingers into the release and yanked through the hydraulic whine and hiss of air, tossing the helmet aside and shifting his brother’s head to get a look at the wound. Coyote dropped the stone and scampered forward to join him.

 

“I didn’t hurt ‘im too bad, did I?” he mumbled hopefully, and Dragonfly shook his head. 

 

“Fixable.”

 

“How d’ya know it’ll work this time?” Coyote’s brows were knitted, and Dragonfly sighed. 

 

“I’ll wait until he wakes,” he stroked a finger down the scar marring Genji’s jaw. “You should go.”

 

“Are you -,” Dragonfly glanced up with a look of steely resolve, and Coyote stopped his question short, holding his breath. “Just.. Don’ do anything stupid, okay?” 

 

“That’s exactly what I was planning, unfortunately.”

 

\--

 

“Genji?” Dragonfly nudged the still form of his brother, still unconscious in his lap. “Er, Sentai?” a pained groan was his only response. Coyote was long gone, and the green mist was beginning to die down, with its master’s imminent demise, leaving the two of them perched on the roof in a calm darkness. Stars glowed above them, not enough to light up the roof, but something to count while Dragonfly eagerly awaited his brother’s waking. 

 

“You-” Genji rasped, eyes fluttering and fingers digging in to Dragonfly’s skin beneath his sluggish weight. Dragonfly hushed him.

 

“Wake up first,” he whispered, settling the uncoordinated boy up to sit on his knees across from him. Sentai awkwardly rubbed at his eyes with his balled fists and cracked his jaw out, reaching back to inspect the damage from his injury, and Dragonfly withdrew. 

 

“Why are you,” Genji interrupted himself to cough, dark eyes finally cracking open. “Still here?”

 

“To apologize,” Dragonfly murmured, laying his hands flat on his knees. Sentai balked, paused midway through wiping his lips free of dried blood. “What I did to you was motivated by anger and wrath, and not something that a hero should be responsible for.”

 

“What the fuck makes you think some half-assed “sorry” is gonna fix anything?” Sentai snarled, wobbling to his feet, hunched over Dragonfly’s still seated form. 

 

“It won’t,” Dragonfly sighed, reaching out to grasp his brother’s hand. “But I do intend to fix everything.” 

 

Genji ripped his hand away and kicked himself back up to his feet. “I don’t want your sympathy,” he hissed. “Let’s get this over with.” he reached backwards on instinct for his swords, and upon finding them missing, raised his clenched, gloved fists instead. Dragonfly meandered to his feet as well, drawing his bow up from his shoulder. He drew back the string silently, and an arrow appeared, glowing blue in the cradle. 

 

Gritting his teeth with a determined grunt, Sentai dug his feet into the ground beneath them and dashed towards Dragonfly. The head of the arrow tracked his movements, down to the millimeter, and a focus burned behind Dragonfly’s blank expression as his opponent jumped and leapt in an attempt to dodge the projectile that had yet to be fired. 

 

“Ryu ga waga teki wo kurau!” Dragonfly shouted, and Sentai stopped still. The beasts that had fairly ravaged him before, those, he could not dodge. The beasts emerged from the arrowhead, rushing towards him like a neon wind, and he embraced himself for the pain of being gutted once again. 

 

The dragons filled his ears, his mouth, his nose. They flowed over his tongue like cold sand, pouring over his body and wrapping him in a gentle, squeezing embrace. Genji choked in surprise as Dragonfly was blotted from his vision, the roar of thunder, the stinging pungence of ozone, and the bright, humming light of the dragons creating a sensory overload that threatened to spill forth from his forehead. Nothing like the first time, his organs remained intact and no blood was spilled. This was nothing he could have prepared himself for - he sucked in a breath and tasted the sweet of a clean rainfall. 

 

Just as suddenly as the beasts had sprung forth, they left him. With a tremendous leap into the air, they were gone, off to finish their work for their master. Suddenly empty and stunned, Genji stumbled forwards - Dragonfly jumped a step closer to catch him with strong hands beneath his arms. His vision spun, but as Dragonfly’s soft smile came into view, there was something terribly familiar about it. 

 

Dragonfly pulled him closer, and before Genji could find his voice to protest, he was clasped in a warm hug. 

 

“I’m sorry,” Dragonfly murmured, and there was something Genji could recognize in that voice, too. He felt the belts and straps of the hero’s clothing shift, as if by magic, and disappear. “I don’t want to keep secrets from you, Genji.”

 

Genji inched away, tenderly, and looked up into the hero’s face. There were fat tears accruing on his regal chin. Something he had never seen before.

 

“Hanzo?”

**Author's Note:**

> hey!! i know this has been done before but i just had. so many ideas and things i needed to get out for this au that i had to do it myself! no disrespect to the others that have done miraculous au mchanzo, of course. i've got my own hero designs that i'll post shortly on my tumblr (@burst-bomb-bitch), so keep an eye out if you're interested!


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